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BOSTON AND NEW YORK 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

Cfce Rtocrsibc prcstf, Cambridge 

1897 



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Copyright, 1897, 
By GEORGE S. MORISON. 

All rights reserved. 



The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A. 
Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co. 



PREFACE 



This volume has been prepared by Dr. Mori- 
son's children. Apart from their regard for their 
father, there are two reasons why it seems right 
that a memorial of his life should be preserved. 

Dr. Morison was a representative of a class of 
which there are few left ; he was a New Hamp- 
shire boy, who, growing up under conditions which 
would now be thought poverty, but which were 
entirely free from any of the dependence which is 
usually associated with poverty, acquired an edu- 
cation and spent the greater part of his life among 
people of much more general knowledge, but of 
no greater intellectual capacity, than those with 
whom his earliest memory was associated. 

Dr. Morison lived in every decade of the nine- 
teenth century ; he was a Unitarian clergyman 
whose life covered the whole period of Unitarian 
Congregationalism, the controversy which resulted 
in the division of New England Congregational- 
ism taking place while he was receiving his educa- 
tion. But throughout his life Dr. Morison was 



iv PREFACE 

more a Christian than a member of any denomi- 
nation. 

The book has been formed as far as possible of 
selections from Dr. Morison's own words ; but in 
making the selections, things which explained his 
life and exemplified his thoughts have been chosen, 
rather than such as on their own merits might be 
considered the best. The plan of the memoir 
gives the outward facts of his life, and the man 
himself so far as he is revealed by the selections 
from his writings. But those who knew him best 
must feel that his most striking characteristic 
could not be fully shown either by the narrative 
or by the selections. If his character were to be 
given in the most fitting single word, that word 
would be " unselfishness." It was not only a life 
in which generosity was great in proportion to 
means of gratifying it, and in which the giver 
gave himself as freely as what was his, but one 
into which the thought of self seemed never to 
enter. 

Besides other selections, quotations have been 
made from the three following volumes : " His- 
tory of the Town of Peterborough, Hillsborough 
County, New Hampshire," by Albert Smith, M. D., 
LL. D., Boston, 1876 ; " The History of the Mor- 
ison or Morrison Family," by Leonard A. Morri- 



PRE FA CE v 

son, Boston, 1880 ; " The History of Windham 
in New Hampshire (Rockingham County), 1719— 
1883," by Leonard A. Morrison, Boston, 1883. 

The frontispiece is from a photograph taken in 
December, 1889 ; the portrait facing page 88 is 
from a crayon by Cheney, taken in 1842. 

Peterborough, N. H., September 14, 1896. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

I. Ancestry 1 

II. Early Life 25 

III. Early Manhood 51 

IV. New Bedford 69 

V. Milton 100 

VI. Slavery 147 

VII. The War 176 

VIII. Last Years in Milton 206 

IX. Old Age 233 

X. The End 268 

List of Published Writings 291 



JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 



ANCESTRY 

John Hopkins Morison was of pure Scotch 
descent. His ancestors on both sides of the family 
were Scotch-Irish, whose residence in Ireland had 
been comparatively short, and who settled in New 
Hampshire early in the eighteenth century. 

John Morison, his great-great-great-grandfather, 
appears to have been born in the county of Aber- 
deen, in Scotland, in 1628. He moved to Ireland 
before the siege of Londonderry, and was there 
during those terrible days in 1689. He emigrated 
to America about 1720, his son and grandson hav- 
ing preceded him. He settled in Londonderry, 
N. H., where he died February 16, 1736, at the 
reputed age of one hundred and eight. 

His second son, John Morison, was born in Ire- 
land in 1678. He was one of the first sixteen set- 
tlers of Londonderry, N. H., going there in 1719 ; 
he lived there till about 1750, when he removed to 
Peterborough, and was one of the early settlers of 



2 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

that town. He died in Peterborough, June 14, 
1776, aged ninety-eight years. When ten years old, 
with his parents and family he was in the siege of 
Londonderry. Late in life he gave an account 
of the sufferings of that siege to his grandson, 
Hon. Jeremiah Smith, detailing his experience 
while watching at a mouse's hole to catch the 
mouse for food. Judge Smith, when an old man, 
repeated the same story to the great-great-grand- 
son, John Hopkins Morison, who lived till 1896, 
this pathetic incident being thus carried down 
orally by only three lives through more than two 
centuries. 

Thomas Morison, the second son of John Mori- 
son, was born in Ireland in 1710, and came to 
America with his father. He was one of the ear- 
liest settlers of Peterborough, though it is uncer- 
tain when he came. 

In 1743 or 1744 " he began the farm afterwards 
occupied by him, 1 and built there a camp against 
a large bowlder, having a perpendicular side on the 
east of six or seven feet height, against which the 
camp was constructed and the camp-fire built. The 
party went from Lunenburg on foot, with axes, 
packs of provisions, and cooking-utensils on their 
backs, threading their way through the unfre- 
quented forests, guided by blazed trees. The large 
bowlder served, with its vertical face, to shelter and 
1 Now owned by George S. Morison. 



ANCESTRY 3 

support the camp, and furnished it with a fireplace 
and chimney. It is related in a manuscript ac- 
count of this affair that, when they went out one 
morning, they perceived two Indian men, a squaw, 
and a small Indian. They intended to he friendly 
and spoke to them, and invited them to take break- 
fast with them, which they did. After the depar- 
ture of the Indians they went out to their work, 
but when they returned for dinner they found that 
the Indians had stolen every mouthful of their eat- 
ables and disappeared. They immediately set out 
for Townsend [about twenty-five miles], not being 
able to obtain the least sustenance till they reached 
that place. They went again to Peterborough in 
the fall or winter, at which time all the inhabi- 
tants were frightened away and left the town till 
1749. In 1749 Morison returned to Peterborough, 
and built a house of hard-pine logs ten inches 
square, into which he moved his family in the fall 
of 1750. He resided on his farm till his death, No- 
vember 23, 1797, aged eighty-seven years. Thomas 
Morison and William Smith, and they only, are 
always styled, in Peterborough town records, 
' gentlemen.' He was universally known as Capt. 
Thomas Morison, and marched his company on 
one occasion to Keene, twenty miles, through the 
woods, on a false alarm that the Indians had at- 
tacked that place." l 

Thomas Morison married Mary Smith, while 
his sister Elizabeth married her brother, William 

1 History of the Morison Family, p. 134. 



4 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

Smith. The result was two families of identical 
blood. Hon. Jeremiah Smith was one of the sons 
of William and Elizabeth Smith ; his brothers, 
Samuel and John, though less known beyond the 
limits of Peterborough, were equally esteemed 
there. 

Robert, the second son and third child of Thomas 
Morison, was born in Lunenburg, Mass., in 1744. 
He came to Peterborough with his father, and sub- 
sequently occupied and owned the farm which his 
grandfather, John Morison, had occupied. He 
married Elizabeth Holmes. He was a deacon in 
the Presbyterian Church. In 1791 his house was 
burned and the church records destroyed ; in the 
same year he built on a different site a house which 
is still standing and in which John Hopkins Mor- 
ison was born. He died in 1826, aged eighty-two 
years. 

Nathaniel Morison, the third son of Deacon 
Robert Morison, and the oldest who survived in- 
fancy, was born in Peterborough, October 9, 1779. 
His life is best described by giving in full an ac- 
count sent by his son, the subject of this memoir, 
to Dr. Albert Smith in 1876, and printed in Dr. 
Smith's History of Peterborough. 

" Of my ancestors on my father's side beyond 
John Morison, my grandfather's grandfather, I 



ANCESTRY 5 

know nothing. He lived to be ninety-eight years 
old. For many years he was looked up to with 
great respect by the younger members of the fam- 
ily. From what I could learn, I have inferred that 
he was a man of sound judgment, of a mild dispo- 
sition, and a natural dignity of character, a man to 
command the confidence of others. The account 
which I gave of him in the Centennial was taken 
from the recollections of his two grandchildren, 
Jeremiah Smith and Sally Morison, both of whom 
had very distinct and pleasant recollections of him 
as, more than any one else, the patriarch of the 
town. 

" His son, Capt. Thomas Morison, was a more 
enterprising and ambitious man, with greater ac- 
tivity of mind and greater force of character. 
These more efficient traits were ascribed to his 
mother, Margaret Wallace, who wished her house, 
if it must be a log-house, to be a log higher than 
any other in the place. During the active period 
of his life he was, I suppose, one of the five or six 
leading men in Peterborough. 

" His sons were none of them remarkable men. 
Three of his daughters, Polly, Sally, and Mrs. Wal- 
lace, were uncommonly intelligent. My grandfa- 
ther, Robert Morison, was a man of good sense, 
but of moderate ability. He was a very devout 
man. I have seen many of his letters to my 
father that were marked by a degree of practical 
good judgment which I fear he did not know how 
to apply to his own affairs ; for he was always in 
debt, and always appealing to my father for pecu- 
niary assistance. 



6 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

" My father, Nathaniel Morison, was the only 
one of his children who had more than ordinary 
ability. Ezekiel, his youngest son, was a man of cor- 
rect and industrious habits ; he died young in Mis- 
sissippi. Nathaniel was born October 11, 1779. In 
1802 he went with an invoice of chairs to some place 
in the West Indies, but finding no market for them 
there he took them to Wilmington, N. C. After dis- 
posing of them he went to Fayetteville, in the same 
State, and entered into the business of making car- 
riages. In 1804 he came to New England and mar- 
ried Mary Ann Hopkins, who was born in that part 
of Londonderry which is now Windham, and re- 
turned to his business in Fayetteville with his wife, 
where he remained till 1807. Then, at the urgent 
solicitation of his father, he came back to Peterbor- 
ough, and settled down with his wife and daughter, 
having bought his father's farm. He brought with 
him five thousand dollars in specie, and there were 
still considerable sums of money due him at the 
South. In five years he had laid up between six 
and seven thousand dollars. He was not fitted to 
be a farmer. The success of a more extended enter- 
prise, and the habits formed in a different sphere, 
made him restless under its slow and limited oper- 
ations. In 1811, 1 believe, he returned to Fayette- 
ville to settle up his affairs there, and when he 
returned he brought with him John H. Steele, 1 a 
young man whom he had found there, and consid- 

1 John H. Steele was Governor of New Hampshire in 1844 and 
1845 ; one of his Thanksgiving proclamations was written by J. 
H. Morison. 



ANCESTRY 7 

ered a very ingenious and capable mechanic, and 
who afterwards filled so important a place in Peter- 
borough. Three or four years more passed by, 
when he purchased for ten thousand dollars what 
was then called the South Factory, and devoted all 
his energies to that and kindred enterprises. He 
put up a building for the manufacture of fine linen, 
particularly table-cloths. The women in Peterbor- 
ough and the neighboring towns were famous for 
their labors at the distaff. The object of this new 
undertaking was to weave, by improved processes, 
the linen yarn that was spun in the vicinity. The 
looms were worked by hand, but with what was 
called a spring shuttle, then a new invention. In 
connection with these factories my father, now a 
militia captain, opened a small store, and he had 
upon his hands all that he could attend to. 

" But he had chosen an unfortunate time for 
these investments. The war with England was 
soon over. The country was flooded with foreign 
goods. There was no sale for our domestic pro- 
ducts. The factories were closed. His little com- 
petence melted away. He was embarrassed with 
debts. His farm and factory property were heavily 
mortgaged. Por all industrial enterprises, the term 
from 1815 to 1820 was a period of greater depres- 
sion than any other period of five years during the 
present century. After struggling in vain with 
adverse events, and with embarrassments which 
were constantly increasing, he went to Mississippi, 
in the fall of 1817, to collect a considerable debt 
that was due him there. He carried out with him 



8 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

a few cases of axes and shoes, which he disposed 
of at a good profit. He collected his debt so as to 
reach home in the spring of 1818. 

" While he was in Natchez, he became ac- 
quainted with several gentlemen of large fortunes, 
and made a contract with them to supply the city 
with water by means of lead pipes for $30,000. 
On reaching home he engaged a competent man 
in New Hampshire to lay the pipes, and in the 
autumn of 1818 he went out with a larger supply 
of axes, ploughs, and shoes. But the boat which 
carried a part of his merchandise struck a snag 
and sunk in the Mississippi ; and when he reached 
Natchez, and had made all his arrangements and 
got his men and materials there to supply the city 
with water, the Southern gentlemen repudiated 
the contract which he supposed they had made, 
and the whole enterprise, with consequences ruin- 
ous to all his hopes, was thrown back upon him. 
He had recourse again to his old occupation, and 
endeavored to gain a little money by working as a 
wheelwright and carriage-maker. But disappoint- 
ment, anxiety, and the hot, malarious summer cli- 
mate there were too much for him. He was taken 
down by the yellow fever, and after a few days of 
severe suffering, in which he was carefully attended 
by his brother Ezekiel, and his townsman, John 
Scott, Jr., he died on the 11th day of September, 
1819, just before he had completed his fortieth year. 
Rumors of his death had already reached us, when, 
on a cold, cloudy, November Saturday afternoon, 
I, then a boy of eleven, walked to the village to 



ANCESTRY 9 

see if any letter had come by the mail. On enter- 
ing your father's store just before dark, I heard 
the people talking of the report, and, as they did not 
know me, they kept on with their conversation till 
I had received the letter. I had a sad journey 
home in the dark night, and the burst of grief with 
which the first line of the letter was greeted was 
more than I could bear. The next morning my 
grandfather called us all together to prayers as 
the custom was of a Sunday morning, and I shall 
never forget the solemnity and pathos with which 
the old man, with trembling hands and a voice 
broken with emotion, read the third chapter of 
Lamentations : ' I am the man that hath seen afflic- 
tion by the rod of his wrath. He hath led me, 
and brought me into darkness, but not into light.' 

" A month or two before, when news of the 
falling through of the Natchez enterprise had 
reached this part of the country, the sheriff had 
come to our house and taken possession of every- 
thing that the law allowed him to take. The 
sharpest pang that I felt at that time was in wit- 
nessing my mother's anguish, and, next to that, 
was when I saw the officers of the law drive away 
a pair of young steers that I had watched over and 
tended and fondled ever since they were born. I 
did not see them again for three years, and it was 
very painful to me then to find that I could not get 
from them any sign of affection or recognition. 
They had entirely forgotten me. After my father's 
death, we remained in the old homestead through 
the winter till March or April, 1820. My mother 



10 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

had for her portion a shell of a house near the 
South Factory and eight hundred dollars. It re- 
quired half the money to convert the ' old weaving- 
shop ' into a tolerable residence. I remember well 
the earnest gaze and the deep sigh with which, on 
leaving our early home, where all her children but 
one had been born, she looked back upon it, with 
a baby on each arm, and then turned slowly away 
towards her new home. She had been left alone 
in the fall of 1818 with seven children, the oldest 
thirteen years, and the two youngest four months 
old. All her means of support consisted of a half- 
finished house, two cows, and four or five hundred 
dollars. She had a most delicate, sensitive nature, 
but a force of will and an amount of executive en- 
ergy such as I have never seen surpassed. In my 
remembrance of her, as she was during the early 
period of her widowhood, I always think of her 
sitting at her loom, working and weeping. She 
did not stop to indulge in discouraging apprehen- 
sions, but emphasized her grief by driving her 
shuttle with increased promptness and vehemence. 
With a resolution that almost broke her heart, she 
put her two oldest boys, one eleven and the other 
nine years old, into farmers' families to work for 
their living. Lessons of" honest industry and help- 
fulness and self-dependence were thus learned. If 
there was a great deal of suffering on their part 
and on hers, caused by severe labor and a divided 
household, habits were formed which contributed 
largely to whatever measure of usefulness or suc- 
cess they may have attained. The heaviest burden 



ANCESTRY 11 

rested upon our oldest sister, whose ability and 
willingness to help all the rest shut her out from 
the advantages of education which the others en- 
joyed. 

" My father was endowed with abilities ill 
adapted to his calling, and very much beyond what 
was required by the sphere in which he lived. He 
read the best books with a keen delight. The few 
letters of his which I have seen showed marks of a 
mental strength and culture superior to what we 
usually find in the correspondence even of the city 
merchants who lived at that time. Your uncle 
John, who was his teacher one winter, spoke to his 
brother Jeremiah of his mind, and his ingenuous, 
truthful qualities, with a sort of enthusiastic ad- 
miration. If he could have had the educational 
advantages which his sons enjoyed, I have no doubt 
that he would have been one of the most distin- 
guished among all the natives of Peterborough. 
As it was, his lot was a very hard one, and his life 
very sad. He was a man of delicate sensibilities 
and generous impulses. He was fitted for intellec- 
tual pursuits, and would have made an admirable 
lawyer. But he had no special aptness for me- 
chanical employments or for trade. His thoughts 
moved in a different sphere. I have heard his 
social and conversational qualities very highly 
spoken of. But he had no special aptitude or taste 
for the sort of life that was put upon him. After 
the success of his early days, which certainly indi- 
cated no common ability even in uncongenial pur- 
suits, he failed in almost everything that he under- 



12 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

took. His plan for introducing improved methods 
of manufacturing linen cloth showed originality of 
mind and no lack of judgment. Nor could any 
one situated as he was be likely to anticipate the 
disastrous effects of peace on our domestic indus- 
tries. And no honorable man would suspect the 
arbitrary repudiation of a contract like that which 
he had made in Natchez. 1 But the disappointment 
was not on that account any the less severe to him. 
He became disheartened and unhappy. He was 
never, I think, according to the ideas then prevail- 
ing, an intemperate man, but amid his disappoint- 
ments and trials he probably fell in too much with 
the habits of those around him. Indeed, when I 
look at his ledger and see what quantities of rum 
and toddy almost everybody drank in those days, I 
wonder how it was that any one could have been 
saved from being a drunkard. My mother was so 
impressed with a sense of the evils and perils in 
this direction, and warned her children against 
them with such intensity of feeling, that I have no 
doubt she had seen, in her home, influences and 
dangers which we were not old enough to under- 
stand. In common with almost every woman 
around her, she used snuff ; but from her own ex- 
perience, and what she saw in others of the misery 
of such a bondage, she had a violent antipathy to 
it, and brought up her children with such a feeling 
against it that not one of her five sons has ever, I 
believe, used an ounce of tobacco. 

1 In justice to the people of Natchez, it should he said that the 
contract was not put in writing. 



ANCESTRY 13 

" My mother's father, John Hopkins, was a shoe- 
maker. 1 He was a man of an easy, happy tempera- 
ment, who, it is said, would sit at work on his shoe- 
maker's bench in winter, and sing Scotch songs all 
day long without repeating a single song. His 
wife, however, Isabella Reid, was of a very differ- 
ent temperament, and belonged to a family of very 
marked and powerful characteristics. She was a 
woman of strong convictions, and of great energy 
of mind and body. She, like her daughter Mary 
Ann, could do two or three days' work in one, and 
had no patience with the idleness or inefficiency of 
other people. She probably did for the Hopkinses 
what Margaret Wallace had done for the Morisons 
three generations before, and introduced into the 
race a much more energetic type of character. 
She lived to a great age [only 83], with her son 
James Hopkins, in Antrim. I remember her 
prompt and decisive interference on two or three 
occasions at my father's. Once, when I was a very 
young boy, I took a small amount of honey from 
one of our beehives, and escaped without injury. 
But when the experiment was tried a second time, 
it seemed to me as if the whole swarm of bees, 
with their stings in active exercise, had settled 
down on my head. Instantly, on hearing the cries 



1 This is the original word used by Mr. Morison in his letter to 
Dr. Smith. In the History of Peterborough this word ' ' shoe- 
maker " was changed at the request of his brother, N. H. Morison, 
to " farmer." John Hopkins owned and worked his own farm in 
Windham ; he had also learned the shoemaker's trade, and had 
his shoemaker's bench at his own house. 



14 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

sent out by the child, my grandmother appeared 
with a bowl of water and quickly drove away my 
offended avengers of their rights. 1 Not long be- 
fore her death I saw her in Antrim. She was very 
feeble and very kind. Just before I left her, she 
unlocked a private drawer, and took from it two 
silver half-dollars, which she asked me to give to 
my mother. I was greatly affected by her kind- 
ness, for it was probably nearly all the money that 
she had. 

" Here is a very slight sketch of those who have 
gone before us, and whose lives are transmitted 
through our veins to those who shall come after 
us. I believe in inherited qualities, but it is diffi- 
cult to reconcile with this belief the very different 
qualities of those' who inherit the same blood. For 
example, your grandfather, William Smith, and his 
wife, Elizabeth Morison, were the brother and sis- 
ter of my great-grandmother, Mary Smith, and her 
husband, Thomas Morison. The blood in the two 
families was the same, and the circumstances under 
which they entered life were substantially the same. 
Yet every one of the six sons of William Smith 
was a man of marked ability, and not one of the 
sons of Thomas Morison was much, if at all, above 
mediocrity. Samuel was a shrewd, thrifty man, 
but that was all. Three of the daughters of 
Thomas Morison, however, were uncommon women. 

1 On his return from Europe in 1876, Dr. Morison brought with 
him a photograph of a drawing by Albert Durer of Cupid fleeing 
from a hive of bees to the protection of his beautiful mother, 
which he had bought in memory of this event. 



ANCESTRY 15 

Mary — the Aunt Polly who was so long in your 
father's store — was, I suppose, one of the most 
brilliant women ever born in Peterborough. Her 
sister Sally was, as Judge Smith used to say, a 
born lady. Her intellectual and moral qualities, 
and delicate, womanly susceptibilities, were admir- 
ably harmonized. She took snuff and smoked a 
pipe, and yet no one could meet her or talk with 
her without feeling that she was a refined and del- 
icate woman. Margaret, the wife of Matthew Wal- 
lace, was said to be a woman of uncommon ability. 
" We sometimes seem to recognize different an- 
cestors in our different moods and feelings at dif- 
ferent times. When I am indulging in the thought 
of projects vastly beyond my ability to carry out, 
I feel my great-gi'eat-grandmother, the ambitious 
Margaret Wallace, stirring my blood, and call to 
mind my grandfather's caution to his son to re- 
member that his name was Morison, and not un- 
dertake more than he could do. When I feel very 
much fixed in any decision, and unwilling to be 
reasoned out of it, right or wrong, I feel something 
of the Holmes obstinacy rising up within my veins. 
When I am in an easy, indolent mood, and dis- 
posed to let the day go by without effort in pleas- 
ant dreams, I think of my grandfather Hopkins, 
whose name I bear, and his Scotch songs. If I 
ever succeed in stripping off its surroundings, and 
looking calmly and clearly into a difficult and im- 
portant subject without prejudice on either side, I 
rejoice to feel that I have in me something of the 
mild, unbiased good sense which has come down 



16 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

from the Smiths as they were before they were 
united with the Morisons. In this way I lead dif- 
ferent lives, and feel myself swayed by widely differ- 
ent impulses, and brought under the influence of 
different ancestors, according to the mood that 
happens to be uppermost. Sometimes I feel as if 
I were my father, looking out from 'his eyes and 
walking in his gait ; and then I detect the mother 
in the earnestness with which I find myself gazing 
on some person before me, as your uncle, Judge 
Smith, seemed to see his sister Betty when he put 
on her cap and looked at himself in the glass." 1 

It seemed as if every circumstance combined to 
render the failure and death of his father particu- 
larly sad. The parting of the father from his 
family had been pathetic ; he was too much af- 
fected to bid them good-by, but walked off alone, 
leaving a wagon to follow which overtook him and 
carried him on. More than seventy years after 
this departure of his father, on the day of the open- 
ing of the bridge across the Mississippi River at 
Memphis, Tenn., in May, 1892, he wrote to his 
oldest son, the chief engineer of the bridge : — 

" One thing which you may not have thought of 
has been pressing itself on my mind with a deep 
and tender pathos. Some hundreds of miles below 
Memphis, on the left bank of the same great river 
which has been the scene of your successful labor 

1 History of Peterborough, pp. 179*— 186*. 



ANCESTRY 17 

and triumph, is the now unknown grave of my fa- 
ther, who ended his short life at Natchez. lie went 
out to fulfill a contract which he hoped would en- 
able him to live in comfort. But the contract was 
repudiated. He strove hopelessly for something 
better, and died bitterly disappointed, knowing 
that he was leaving his family of seven young 
children, with their mother, in what seemed to be 
helpless and hopeless poverty. The contrast be- 
tween my father and my son in their experiences 
on the border of that mighty river has been con- 
stantly in my mind with its extremes of darkness 
and light." 

Nathaniel Morison married, September 13, 1804, 
Mary Ann Hopkins, of Londonderry. They had 
seven children, five sons and two daughters, all of 
whom lived to mature age and have left descend- 
ants. John Hopkins Morison was their second 
child and the oldest son. 

John Hopkins, the grandfather of Mary Ann, 
came with his wife and children from Ireland in 
1730 and settled in Londonderry, where his son of 
the same name was born March 10, 1739. The 
second John Hopkins married Isabella Reid. Mary 
Ann was their daughter, and by her marriage Polly 
Hopkins became Mary Morison. She survived her 
husband nearly thirty years, and died at the home 
of her daughter in Medina, Michigan, August 22, 
1848. No mother was ever more revered by her 



18 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

children. The following account, prepared by her 
third sou, Nathaniel Holmes Morison, is given 
here almost in full, though to some degree a repe- 
tition of what the older brother had written of his 
father : — 

" Mary Ann (Hopkins) Morison, daughter of 
John Hopkins and Isabella Reid, was born in 
Windham, September 8, 1779. She was the twin 
sister of Betsey Ann Hopkins, born two days later, 
who married Dea. James Gregg. Her youth was 
passed at home in the household occupations of a 
farmer's daughter, cooking, spinning, weaving, and 
the care of the dairy, in all of which she excelled. 
She was said to be the most skilled and rapid spin- 
ner of flax in the town. The large willow-tree, 
still standing near the site of the old homestead, 
was the scene of many a contest in spinning be- 
tween the twin sisters and the young maidens of 
the neighborhood. A platform had been con- 
structed among its branches, and the wheels were 
often taken there for these trials of skill. Ann, 
as she was called by the family, was also a bold 
and skillful rider, and, mounted on her horse, with 
wheel and flax, she often visited the neighboring 
farms on summer afternoons for a social chat or a 
spinning-match with the young girls of her own 
age. She often said that she had only three weeks 
of regular schooling ; but her own efforts and those 
of her parents made up for this deficiency, and her 
education was quite up to the standard of her day. 
She was never a great reader like her husband, but 



ANCESTRY 19 

she was always fond of listening to reading, whether 
from the Bible, history, or the lighter literature of 
the time, and she always had the highest respect 
for learning. 

" As a young girl and woman she was considered 
very beautiful, being tall with rather small fea- 
tures and a fine figure. She was said to be the 
belle of the dancing-school, and her fame for grace 
and beauty spread far beyond the limits of her 
native town. She also had a fine ear for music 
and a good voice. Her father was the best song- 
singer of his day, and his daughter inherited his 
taste and his talent. She became the life of social 
gatherings, singing with great spirit and with 
touching sympathy the old Scotch ballads and 
songs of her race, and at a later day the patriotic 
songs of the new country, especially those written 
on the naval battles of the war of 1812-15. After 
leading the life of a country belle through all her 
early womanhood, she married, September 13, 
1804, at the age of twenty-five, Nathaniel Morison, 
of Peterborough, who was just a month and a day 
younger than herself. 

" Her husband had established himself two 
years before at Fayetteville, N. C, as a successful 
manufacturer of carriages, and had returned from 
that distant city to claim his promised bride. Im- 
mediately after the marriage, they set out on horse- 
back for Salem, Mass., where they embarked on 
a small sailing-vessel for their new home. They 
remained in Fayetteville, where their oldest child 
was born, for three years, till 1807, when they 



20 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 



« 



returned to the North, with what was regarded im 
those days as a competent fortune, and settled im 
Peterborough, on the homestead of the family. M 
few years later her husband purchased the South! 
Factory, with its boarding-houses and store, still 
retaining his farm and living upon it. This pur- 
chase proved disastrous financially. To collect 
some old debts and to retrieve his fortune, he went 
to Mississippi in 1817, where he made a contract 
with some leading capitalists of Natchez to intro- 
duce water into that city. On returning to the 
South in 1818 with men and materials for the 
work, he was astonished to find that his principals, 
without the slightest notice to him, had changed 
their mind, and now repudiated the contract they 
had solemnly made the year before. Confounded, 
disheartened, and financially ruined by this breach 
of faith, he became an easy prey to the yellow 
fever, then prevalent in that region, and died at 
Natchez, September 11, 1819, in the fortieth year 
of his age. 

" The family estate had been heavily mortgaged 
to raise funds for his great undertaking in Missis- 
sippi, and factory, store, houses, lands, stock, and 
machinery were all seized to satisfy the demands 
of creditors. Mrs. Morison, reduced at once from 
affluence to poverty, bore her misfortunes with 
wonderful courage and fortitude. Left with seven 
children, five sons and two daughters, the oldest a 
daughter of fourteen, and the youngest twins of a 
year, she had no property but her widow's dower 
with which to support and educate this large and 



ANCESTRY 21 

helpless family. In the settlement of the estate, 
a shell of a house was assigned to her in the 
Southern Village, with two cows, a few acres for 
grass, a few more for wood, and $800 in money, a 
considerable part of which had to be spent in con- 
verting the house into a comfortable dwelling. . . . 
She put her two oldest boys, one eleven, the other 
nine years old, into farmers' families to work for 
their living. She pursued the same course with 
her three younger boys as soon as they were old 
enough to be useful on a farm, and the help of her 
two daughters was utilized in the most effective 
manner. The whole household was busy in useful 
industry to earn their daily bread and make their 
home comfortable and pleasant. Her brother, 
James Hopkins, Esq., of Antrim, had looked after 
her interests during the trying scenes that followed 
the death of her husband, and he took charge of 
her little fund of money, which was carefully hus- 
banded ; and its expenditure was sparingly spread 
over all the years of her children's dependence 
upon her. 

' k She was an expert weaver, and her chief in- 
come was derived from weaving for the neighbor- 
ing farmers, the usual price being six cents a yard. 
She employed the girls and younger children in 
winding the spools and quills, while the shuttle 
flew with a rapidity seldom equaled on a hand- 
loom. She would sometimes weave as many as 
thirty yards in a day, besides attending to all her 
household duties. She also wove quilts and the 
most beautiful figured linens, such as table-cloths 



22 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

of complicated patterns, sometimes using as many 
as twelve treadles. Towards the close of her life, 
when entirely easy in her circumstances, she spun 
and wove a heavy counterpane of a beautiful varie- 
gated pattern, and with a heavy fringe, for each of 
her seven children, doing the entire work herself. 

" Her great desire for her sons was to give them 
the best education that the country schools could 
afford, and a good trade ; but the love of know- 
ledge inherited from their father, and the energy 
derived from both parents, carried four of them 
through Harvard College, and raised them to posi- 
tions of honor, responsibility, and usefulness that 
she had never dreamed possible. She at one time 
used snuff, but she gave up the habit, and so im- 
pressed the minds of her sons with its evil effects 
on purse and health that not one of them ever used 
an ounce of tobacco. She lived to see all [but 
one] of her children happily married, and the last 
years of her life were as beautiful, serene, and 
happy as its middle course had been hard and try- 
ing. Her younger daughter, a delicate, refined, 
and cultivated woman, with much of her mother's 
energy of character, had married and moved to a 
log-cabin in the wilds of Michigan. The severe 
trials of frontier life had broken her health and 
threatened her life. In the fall of 1846 her 
mother went out to see and to help her, with no 
knowledge of the fevers of that new country, almost 
sure to be fatal to a person of her age. She 
brought to the heart of her invalid daughter all 
the comfort she expected to give ; but in the sum- 



ANCESTRY 23 

mer of 1848 she took the malarial fever so fatal 
to elderly persons, and after a few days' sickness, 
died at Medina, Mich., August 27, at the age of 
sixty-nine. She was a woman of uncommon en- 
ergy, decision, and perseverance, with a large fund 
of common sense to guide and control her, with 
broad views, high aims, and a loving heart ; and 
4 her children arise up and call her blessed.' " * 

The autograph signatures of the second John 
Morison and his son Captain Thomas Morison 
show the name spelled distinctly Morison ; on their 
gravestones in the old Peterborough graveyard the 
name is spelled Morrison. The signatures of Dea- 
con Robert Morison and his son Nathaniel show 
the name spelt Morrison, though in at least one in- 
stance the latter spelt it Morison. John Hopkins 
Morison restored the old spelling, and the name 
was spelt by him and all his brothers and their 
descendants in the same way that it was spelt in 
the earliest records. Mr. Leonard A. Morrison, 
the historian of the Morison family in America, 
writes : — 

" In early days, the family in Scotland, Eng- 
land, Ireland, and America almost invariably 
spelled their name with one r, thus : Morison. 
This was the customary orthography till about the 
year 1800, when the change to Morrison became 
general in Scotland, England, Ireland, and Amer- 

1 History of Windham, pp. 675-678. 



24 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

ica, and has continued to the present time. The 
family in Londonderry, N. H., followed the gen- 
eral custom. . . . Morison is the original mode of 
spelling. It comes nearer the supposed deriva- 
tion of the name, and appears to be the correct 
orthography." 1 

1 History of the Morison Family, p. 20. 



II 

EARLY LIFE 

John Hopkins Morison was born in the house 
which his grandfather had built in 1791, and which 
now belongs to the family of his brother Horace, 
in the southwest part of Peterborough, on the 25th 
of July, 1808. He was given the name of his 
mother's father and grandfather, the name most 
appropriate for a first-born son. His early child- 
hood, while he had as many comforts as the other 
children of the town, was one of hardship compared 
with the life of to-day. His allowance of shoes 
was one pair a year, and from the time that they 
wore out in the spring till the next pair was sup- 
plied, late in the fall, he went barefoot. Peter- 
borough was then almost entirely a farming town. 
The older people still spoke the Scotch brogue. 
The South School which he attended had over 
sixty scholars. In 1876 he wrote : — 

" At the age of three I began to attend school 
in the summer, but after I was six years old my 
services on the farm were thought too valuable to 
be dispensed with, and, from that time forth till I 
was sixteen, I went to school only in the winter, 
from eight to twelve weeks in a year." 1 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 186*. 



26 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

Few New England towns have more natural 
beauty than Peterborough. The original town- 
ship was laid out six miles square, the Contoocook 
River running nearly through the centre. On the 
west of the valley rises the Monadnoc, which was 
generally known as the Grand Monadnoc. On 
the east rise two hills, commonly called in Peter- 
borough the East Mountains, but formerly known 
as the Petty Monadnocs ; to the north, Kearsarge 
is visible in the distance. While the plain coun- 
try people talked little of these surroundings, the 
boy felt an influence which he did not express. 
The old meeting-house was on a high hill about 
three miles from his home. After the New En«-- 
land fashion, a single building served for both 
church and town hall : it was a square, frame 
structure ; the pews were square, with hinged seats 
that were lifted when the congregation stood dur- 
ing prayers, and with a little top rail supported 
by rungs, which the children could turn with their 
hands, and which would sometimes squeak. There 
were galleries, and a high pulpit with a sounding- 
board ; there was no steeple, and the building was 
never painted. The meeting-house had a com- 
manding view of the Grand Monadnoc and the 
other hills : the boy thought of the scene as like 
the mountains round about Jerusalem. Here were 



EARLY LIFE 27 

held the services on Sunday to which the whole 
family went. Not far from the meeting-house was 
the old graveyard of the town, where three genera- 
tions of the boy's ancestors were buried ; and hard 
by stood an old beech-tree, of which a brilliant son 
of Peterborough has said : — 

" Many are the noble resolutions that young 
minds have formed under the shade of the old 
beech-tree. Intellectual indolence is the prevailing 
fault of our times. Under the old beech, in my 
young days, the great and the talented men of this 
town used to assemble, and there discuss with dis- 
tinguished power and ability the most important 
topics. Religion, politics, literature, agriculture, 
and various other important subjects were there 
discussed. Well, distinctly well, do I remember 
those debates, carried on by the Smiths, the Mori- 
sons, the Steeles, the Holmeses, the Robbes, the 
Scotts, the Todds, the Millers, and, perhaps I may 
be excused here for adding, the Wilsons and 
others. No absurd proposition or ridiculous idea 
escaped exposure for a single moment. A debater 
there had to draw himself up close, be nice in his 
logic and correct in his language, to command re- 
spectful attention. Abler discussion was never lis- 
tened to anywhere." 1 

An important religious influence was a little 
private Sunday-school kept in a deserted house 
near his home by Fanny Smith, the granddaughter 

1 Gen. James Wilson at Peterborough Centennial Dinner. 



i 



28 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

of William Smith, who walked over from a neigh- 
boring town every week. She was a talented but 
eccentric woman, very Orthodox in her views, but 
she gave her pupils the choice between the New 
Testament and the Westminster Catechism ; the 
boy chose the former, and committed to memory a 
large part of the New Testament. In her later 
years she became deeply interested in the anti- 
slavery movement, and her Calvinism was molli- 
fied. Late in life she went one Sunday to the 
church where the boy whom she had once instructed 
preached, and after the service she came and told 
him that she could hear nothing, but that his ges- 
tures reminded her of his great-grandfather. She 
died in 1858, and left by her will a sum of money 
to erect a monument over her grave, on three respec- 
tive sides of which were to be placed the names of 
her great-grandfather's children, her grandfather's 
children, and her father's children, her own name 
appearing only among the latter, while the fourth 
side was to contain these words : — 

" This side of the column is devoted to the sa- 
cred cause of Emancipation. May God bless it, 
and all the people say, Amen ! " 

This monument, erected nearly three years be- 
fore the war, stands over her grave in the Peter- 
borough village graveyard. 



EARLY LIFE 29 

On the death of his father his home life came to 
an end, and at the age of eleven the boy began 
earning his own living. Of this period he writes : — 

" In the autumn of 1819 my father died, and 
his family was left in great affliction, and in very 
straitened circumstances. From 1820 to 1824, I 
lived with different farmers in the town, working 
hard, faring as well as they did, and receiving but 
scanty wages, never, I think, more than fifty dol- 
lars a year, even when I did nearly a man's work. 
I look back upon those four years as the most un- 
happy period of my life. The change from our 
own home to a place with strangers was a painful 
one, not because I was treated unkindly, but from 
a feeling that I was fatherless and homeless, and 
from a longing for a better companionship and bet- 
ter means of education. My principal solace was 
to spend the Sunday, once in a month or two, at 
my mother's house. My greatest happiness intel- 
lectually was in reading, often by firelight, with 
my head in a perilously hot place. The books 
which I enjoyed most were the Bible, Rollin's 
Ancient History, Gibbon's Rome, and an odd vol- 
ume or two of Josephus. The little Social Library 
kept by Mr. Daniel Abbot was a great resource to 
me." ! 

He lived with four farmers in different parts of 
Peterborough. The life was not only hard and 
rough, but he sometimes met meanness, hypocrisy, 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 187*. 



30 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

and coarseness, from which even his boyish mind 
revolted. ' Mr. Gibbs, the last man with whom he 
lived, carried the mail between Portsmouth and 
Brattleboro. The boy saw an advertisement in 
an " Exeter News-letter " of a vacant place in a 
store in Exeter. In the hope of relief from the 
hard life he was living, he asked the mail-carrier 
to apply for the situation for him, and he obtained 
it. lie was to work in Mr. Joseph Smith Gilman's 
store and live in his family. He soon found that 
he had exchanged the rough country life for even 
more repulsive surroundings : he had neither taste 
nor aptitude for the work of the store, and, though 
he lived in Mr. Gilman's family, he was at first 
placed among the servants ; but he had entered on 
the course of events which was to shape his whole 
life, as well as the lives of all his brothers. It was 
one of those cases where extreme poverty made re- 
sults possible which a boy of moderate means could 
not have reached. Many years after, he wrote to 
one of his sons that if his father had lived he prob- 
ably never would have received an education. The 
intimate friend of his childhood was a boy named 
James Moore, the son of a neighboring farmer. 
He often contrasted the fate of this boy with his 
own. James Moore was very anxious to go to col- 
lege, but his father felt that he could not send him. 



EARLY LIFE 31 

While still under twenty he left home, crossed the 
Alleghenies, worked his way down the Mississippi 
River, sailed from New Orleans, and died at sea. 

The removal to Exeter changed the entire life of 
the hoy. Of this period he wrote : — 

" In October, 1824, I went to Exeter and lived 
there with Mr. Joseph Smith Gilman, ' tending ' 
in a small grocery store, and doing what a boy 
might be expected to do about the place, for ten 
months. The position and most of its duties were 
distasteful to me. I made some ludicrous and 
embarrassing mistakes. I was not good at a bar- 
gain, and my heart was not in my work. I was 
more homesick than I had ever been. I wondered 
then, and have not ceased to wonder yet, at Mr. 
Oilman's forbearance. He and his family were 
very kind to me, and I shall never think of them 
otherwise than with profound gratitude. But the 
young people whom I was thrown in with were 
more ignorant, and had lower tastes and aims 
in life than any persons I ever knew ; but I had 
a good deal of time for reading and plenty of 
books. Before leaving Peterborough I had for 
six weeks attended a private school kept by Mr. 
Addison Brown, then a student in Harvard Col- 
lege. He had very rare gifts as a teacher. I felt 
that my intellectual nature was then for the first 
time waked up, and life assumed for me a new 
meaning. During the winter in Exeter I attended 
an evening school taught by Mr. Richard Hildreth, 
a man of fine genius, who took great interest in my 



32 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

studies. My progress with him was such that he 
and Mr. Gilrnan, the next summer, called the atten- 
tion of Dr. Abbot, the admirable principal of 
Phillips Exeter Academy, to my case, and, without 
any application on my part, I was allowed to take 
a place among the beneficiaries of the school." 1 

On the fly-leaf of an old copy of Playfair's 
Euclid are written these words : — 

" Had it not been for this book I should prob- 
ably never have gone to College. 

"J. H. M." 

This book was used in the evening school, and 
his interest in this study called the attention to 
him which resulted in his getting an education. It 
would perhaps have been equally correct to say 
that but for this book none of his family would 
ever have entered college. 

In 1825, at the age of seventeen, he entered the 
Phillips Exeter Academy on the charity founda- 
tion. He always regarded the years spent at Exe- 
ter as among the very happiest of his life. Of this 
period he wrote : — 

" Here a new world was opening before me. 
Every branch of study seemed to offer a new de- 
light. Even the primary elements of Latin and 
Greek had for me a singular fascination, and every 
step was an advance into a sort of fairy-land. I 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 1ST*. 



EARLY LIFE 33 

shall never forget the sensations of keen enjoyment 
with which I read the Odes of Horace, the Iliad 
of I Tomer, the Bucolics of Virgil and of Theocritus, 
or the utter absorption of mind with which I went 
through the higher branches of Algebra and Geo- 
metry, and, most of all, the Conic Sections. I re- 
mained in the academy four years, three as a 
scholar and one mostly as a teacher, pursuing my 
sophomore studies by myself. I owe a great debt 
of gratitude to the teachers there, especially to Dr. 
Abbot and Dr. Soule." * 

While in Exeter Academy he kept a somewhat 
irregular diary, combining a narrative with senti- 
mental essays, which were probably more common 
then than they are now. The fly-leaf of this diary 
contains the following : — 

" At the general court, held within the precincts 
of John H. Morrison, in the town of Peterbor- 
ough, county of Hillsborough and State of New 
Hampshire, after very eloquent orations being 
given by Messrs. Reason, Improvement, Indolence, 
and their constituents, Proper improvement of time, 
Diligence, Industry, Good sense, Ease, etc. ; 

" Voted, that J. H. Morrison from the 22d day 
of May A. d. 1826, keep a memorandum true and 
faithful. 

" Attest Observant 

Clerk." 

While at Exeter he was in the habit of visiting 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 187*. 



34 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

his mothei* at Peterborough, usually walking each 
way, a distance of sixty miles. The diary begins 
with one of these walks : — 

" May 22, 1826. Prosecuted my journey, and 
arrived at Exeter, where I found all well, at two 
in the afternoon. I cannot in justice pass over 
a person whom I fell in with upon the road. He 
was a peddler, a foreigner, and, as he said, be- 
longed to Salem. He appeared to be a man of 
a generous disposition ; said his object was to 
do as he would be done by, which precept, so 
far as I saw, was admirably exemplified in him. 
Board at Rev. Mr. Holt's. Mv circumstances now 
are truly discouraging. I have gone too far to fall 
back, and yet possess no means of going farther. 
I am fourteen dollars in debt, without a dollar, and 
without any certain means of obtaining a dollar. 
My destiny is wholly dependent upon charity ; yet 
what encouragement has any one ' to give ' in such 
a case ? It is, I think, extremely doubtful whether 
I obtain my object, but I do not yet despond. I 
will keep hope till there 's cause for none. 

" 23. Attended school, — first day of the term ; 
little done but to regulate the studies for the term. 
My studies are Cicero and the Greek grammar. 
Cicero I begin at the third oration, and the gram- 
mar at verbs. Feelings dull. 

" 24. Nothing of importance transpired. Re- 
cited my regular lessons. Considerably incited to 
study by Marsh, formerly a classmate, who, having 
studied during vacation, went before the class. I 
wish to overtake him. 



EARLY LIFE 35 

" 25. Still more studious than formerly, by the 
reasons mentioned yesterday. In the afternoon 
was put forward with Marsh. Not pleased. 

" 27. Attended meeting and heard Dr. Nichols, 
of Portland, to my entire satisfaction. In the fore- 
noon, he observed, that though the precepts of 
Christ did not in a specific manner lay any injunc- 
tion or restraint upon every great crime, yet they 
were so formed as to render it impossible for a 
man to commit any one not expressly mentioned 
by our Saviour without breaking some important 
command. Though there is no law against tyr- 
anny, ingratitude, and many other things justly 
considered crimes, yet no one could be guilty of 
these acts and yet do as he would be done by. In 
the afternoon he spoke upon repentance. He said 
that it was improper to defer this to a dying hour ; 
for what proof, says he, can there be of the sincer- 
ity, stability, and permanency of that man's faith 
who proves it not by practices. He said, also, that 
it was extremely improper to defer this act to old 
age, and to resign our indulgences when we have 
lost the relish for them ; and, finally, that it was 
better to do nothing worthy of repentance, than to 
be put to the trouble of repenting, — that it was 
better to pursue a course straight forward than 
the opposite way, and be obliged to retrace our 
steps. His prayer, for the students in particular, 
was superior to anything I ever heard. Upon the 
whole, I spent a very agreeable day. 

" 28. Attended school as usual. Recited regu- 



36 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

lar lessons. Saw Mr. J. S. Gilman, who, with re- 
gard to my despondency, said that I must not be 
discouraged, but with renewed diligence pursue my 
studies, and assistance would offer itself. For the 
future this sufficed; but for the present, debts 
which are already due, poor satisfaction. If a 
poor person is in any case to be pitied, it is in en- 
deavoring to obtain an education. Always from 
necessity spending, never earning ; coffers empty, 
with no means of filling them. Surely an educa- 
tion must be of great import to enable one to sur- 
mount all these obstacles, encounter all these diffi- 
culties, and put down all opposition. Spent the 
day in though tfulness." 

" Sunday, [June] 4. ... In the evening I at- 
tended the wedding of Sarah F. Holt, daughter of 
the man with whom I board, and Capt. S. Endicott. 
Being of a disposition prone to laughter, for my 
own part I was scarcely capable of restraining that 
unruly and improper emotion. 

" From Captain Endicott, who is quite an intel- 
ligent man, and who has made nine voyages to 
Calcutta, besides having been to Lapland, Archan- 
gel, Copenhagen, Hamburg, London, Dover, and 
all the seaport towns from Dover to Havre-de- 
Grace, I learned that Lapland was a cold, barren, 
sterile place, the inhabitants doing little else than 
fishing. The sun did not rise for about two months 
whilst he was there. For about four hours in the 
middle of the day, the light was such that they 
could see to read without candles. Copenhagen 



EARLY LIFE 37 

was a very neat, well-built, and pleasant place. 
The weather in the winter is cold. Archangel is 
very cold. Of the Hindoos I shall write to-inor- 
row. A little snow fell to-day. 

" 5. Business as usual. For want of time I omit 
my history of the Hindoos. It accords with well- 
known accounts, as well as that given of Lapland. 

" 9. Lessons as heretofore. In the evening made 
an estimate of board in fitting for college, includ- 
ing last term. The result was found to be $47.97. 

" 10. Weather warm. In the afternoon went to 
Judge Smith's ; he was unwell, and unable to go 
out much. I did not see him, but saw William, 
who said that the part of my expenses for the last 
term should be paid ; as to the future, he was 
unable to determine. My prospects now are dull 
indeed, my spirits a little ' below par.' I made a 
mistake yesterday ; the result was $ 53.47. For 
the past week, I cannot say that I have improved 
my time so well as I ought. He who is dependent 
upon others should do something to deserve their 
patronage. He should have double diligence, for 
he has double incentives to diligence." 

Judge Smith, whose name has already been men- 
tioned, was the double cousin of Deacon Robert 
Morison, the grandfather of J. II. Morison. He 
was considered the representative man of his race 
and town. In 1797 he had removed to Exeter. 
After being a member of Congress, Governor of 



38 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

the State, and twice Chief Justice, he had with- 
drawn from practice in 1820, and was living in 
Exeter, the leading man of the town. He was 
president of the Board of Trustees of Phillips 
Exeter Academy, and also its treasurer. He told 
young Morison that their relationship was near 
enough to be recognized if he did well, and remote 
enough to be neglected if he did poorly. 

" July 4. Independence. Heard an oration de- 
livered by William Ladd, Esq., of Minot. . . . 
In the evening witnessed the romantic exploits of 
sky-rockets, fire-balls, etc." 

The Exeter Fourth of July fire-balls long re- 
mained in his memory as the most attractive of 
fireworks. 

"July 8, Saturday. I spent the principal part 
of the afternoon in meditation. I see no way of 
getting through college, and have resolved to aban- 
don my project at the end of this term, unless 
something favorable to me takes place. Certainly 
nothing can be more painful to me than this reso- 
lution. I hope, though few glimmerings of hojie 
appear, that I shall not have to go. 

" 25. My birthday. I am eighteen years old. 
A plague confound the training establishment 
[militia] which I am about to enter. I intended 
to have written a few lines of poetry to put in here 
on this day, but want of time prevented it. 



EARLY LIFE 39 

"August 2. In the forenoon received a part of 
a dialogue for exhibition. The part consists of 
three lines. In the afternoon no school. I stud- 
ied at the Academy, the principal part of it on 
Milo. My affairs still very dubious and discour- 
aging. 

"August 5. In the afternoon had a digging 
scrape in cleaning the Academy yard, which af- 
forded very good exercise. 

" August 9. Spent the afternoon in being busy 
about nothing. Forenoon as hitherto. My time 
passes slowly, and as dull as slowly. I mean my 
considerate moments, which may not, however, be 
very numerous. 

" 10. Have been rather idle to-day, that is, I 
' got ' my usual recitations, and not much more. I 
fear that I shall get, or rather that I have got, into 
a lazy habit. I have determined now (but I know 
not how I shall fulfill my determination) to study 
' hard ' during vacation, which is now drawing near. 
I may now venture my surmises upon the exhibi- 
tion. I think it will be a very good one. Good-by 
for to-night. 



*» j 



" 12. In the afternoon attended the meeting 
of the Golden Branch, the last for the term. At- 
tended also to a private discussion with James 
Sullivan on the question, Whether is a country or 
city life the more favorable to virtue ? 



40 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

"15. Rehearsed my part in a dialogue for exhi- 
bition. I have hard work to find anything to write 
here nowadays. 

" 16. In the afternoon I attended Hampton 
exhibition, a distance of about seven miles from 
Exeter. I went on foot. The exhibition was des- 
titute of two great qualifications, — original parts 
and comedies, the one of which interests, the other 
amuses the audience. The speaking was generally 
very good, — some exceptions. Very tired, — eyes 
ache. 

" 22. In the forenoon had our sham exhibition. 
In the afternoon attended the funeral of Mr. Ste- 
vens ; from thence went to the court, where I 
heard Mr. Sullivan plead. . . . 

" 23. Examination day. I came off tolerably 
well ; found no difficulty in rendering what I had '■ 
given me, but was a little lost in conjugating a« 
Greek verb. 

" 24. Exhibition. Excepting the valedictory, 
all was very good. In the evening took leave, per- 
haps for the last time, of many friends, among 
others of Emery, my room-mate. He could scarce 
contain himself. 

" 25. Find that I am, upon the whole, 121.76 m 
debt. During the day, did little. Went to Judge 
Smith's. 

• ••••••• 

" 28. Saw to clearing out the hall of the Acad- 
emy. Yesterday went to meeting ; afternoon 1 
heard Mr. Webster, of Hampton. 



EARLY LIFE 41 

" 29. Studied in geography in the forenoon. Had 
an invitation to spend the vacation at Dr. Abbot's, 
which I accepted. 

"30. Read the 'Gentle Shepherd' of Allan 
Ramsay, and was very much pleased with it. By 
the kindness of Dr. Abbot, I have the use of his 
library during my residence at his house. 

" 31. Nothing particular." 

At this time the Harvard Commencement was, 
as its name implies, at the beginning of the colle- 
giate year, on the last Wednesday in August. The 
admission examinations were held in Commence- 
ment week. Preparatory schools, like Exeter 
Academy, kept in session till this time, their sum- 
mer vacation beginning when the college vaca- 
tion ended ; the boys who entered college had no 
vacation that summer. The September vacation 
of 1826 was spent for the most part in Exeter. 
It was short, compared with vacations of the pre- 
sent day ; the exhibition was on the 24th of Au- 
gust, and on the 15th of September the new term 
began. 

" September 14. Rainy in the afternoon and 
evening. I am to have the bell of the Academy 
to ring, the term commencing to-morrow, for which 
I receive six dollars. I am also to receive from 
the establishment next term $1.50 per week. 

" 15. Began to ring the bell ; find it rather dif- 
ficult now at first. Began in my studies at Sallust, 



42 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

and Natural History in the Greek Reader. Have 
studied very little for vacation. 

" 24. Heard Mr. Cleveland preach. Nothing 
worthy of note occurred last week. Mr. J. S. Gil- 
man is very sick of a fever, by some considered 
dangerous. 

" 25. Mr. Gilman is worse ; has had no sense at 
all. He continued as usual in his store until Sat- 
urday evening, though on Friday and Saturday 
many supposed that he knew not what he was 
about. 

" 26. Mr. G., at about twelve or a quarter past 
twelve, departed this life. He has been my prin- 
cipal patron and friend here. Though I have re- 
ceived no pecuniary aid immediately from him, his 
interest for me has been the main source of my at- 
tending this Academy, and I should do injustice to 
myself did I not pay this last tribute of respect to 
him. I came here as a stranger, but found him a 
friend in whom I could trust. That he has used 
me well is not sufficient ; he has used me very well, 
and I shall never forget the obligation which I was 
under to him. 

" 27. In the afternoon attended the funeral 
of Mr. G. at Mr. Hurd's meeting-house. Mr. 
Cleveland delivered a short address and made the 
prayer." 

From October, 1826, to August, 1827, the jour- 
nal contains but three entries. On August 27, 
1827, appears the following : — 



EARLY LIFE 43 

" Was examined and admitted at Cambridge 
College, but concluded to return to Exeter for 
another year. Spent from the Saturday preceding 
examination until the Thursday after it at Charles- 
town with my friend W. Austin." 

" Sunday, October 21. Last Wednesday was 
Cattle-show Day. The address was delivered by 
Win. Smith, Esq., of this town. He began by 
showing the intimate connection between all classes 
of people and farmers ; then gave an account of 
the progress of agriculture in this country, and 
concluded with a beautiful antithesis between this 
and other countries. As an eloquent speech it 
excels anything which I have before heard." 

During this winter he kept the school in the 
south part of his native town now called the Wil- 
son School. 

" November 27. Set out for P., where I expect 
to commence a school next Monday for 10 weeks 
at $20 per month and board myself ; expect to 
board at home. 

" 28. Arrived at P. Attended an exhibition of 
the dramatic club. Was much pleased with the 
performances. 

" 29. Thanksgiving. Attended meeting. Heard 
Mr. Abbot preach very well. 

" February 6, 1828. Finished my school, for 
which I received $47.50. Boarded four first weeks 
at J. Walker's, Esq., the last 4|- at Dea. Smith's. 



44 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" 15. Arrived at Exeter. I find that I am on 
just about equal footing with my class." 

On March 23 his entry is an essay suggested 
by reading Paley's Evidences of Christianity. This 
year we find him again preparing for the exhibi- 
tion, but with a more prominent part than the 
three lines in the dialogue. 

" August 20. Wednesday forenoon, rehearsal for 
exhibition ; afternoon, examination. 

" 21. Forenoon, very busy in preparing the hall ; 
afternoon, exhibition. My part valedictory [two 
lines are here torn from the journal with evident 
intention ; they are followed by the words] my 
performance, but think they were undeserved. In 
the evening attended a meeting of the Alumni of 
the Academy ; was highly pleased." 

Mr. Morison did not join his class at Cambridge 
at the end of the Freshman year, but remained 
another year at Exeter, pursuing the Sophomore 
studies by himself, and also acting as a teacher in 
the Academy. This year he lived with his kinsman, 
Judge Smith, as a member of his family, the young 
man having established the right by which the re- 
lationship was near enough to be claimed. Mrs. 
Smith had died a year before, and during this year 
his daughter died, while his son had contracted 
the same disease (consumption), and died in the 
following spring, the judge being thus left deso- 



EARLY LIFE 45 

late in his old age. Such events had their effect 
on the young man. Many years afterwards he 
wrote : — 

" Their illness and departure, especially the 
rapid and fatal decline of his daughter, a most 
lovely and interesting woman, took me through 
a wholly new experience. This life could never 
again be to me what it had been before. The 
light of worlds beyond had been let in upon it." 1 

The diary for this year, the year that he lived 
with Judge Smith, is very fragmentary, but con- 
tains a few entries covering the close of his Exeter 
life: — 

" August 20, 1829. Exhibition at P. E. Academy. 
I, in the forenoon, delivered an address before the 
Golden Branch, which was heard by a respectable 
audience. These ephemeral things make a great 
noise for an hour or two, but seldom longer. I 
do not think that the highest encomiums upon this 
would render me at all vain. It is always pleasant 
to succeed in what we undertake, but to succeed in 
small things like this cannot be considered either 
a great or a lasting honor. Orators are always 
overloaded with unmeaning compliments. It mat- 
ters but little how vapid are their thoughts. 
Though censure would be disagreeable, praise can 
hardly be considered worth anything." 

He left Exeter on the 27th of August, 1829, for 
Cambridge, where he underwent his last exami- 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 188*. 



46 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

nation on the 28th, and at the beginning of the 
Junior year became actively a member of the class 
of 1831, with which he had passed the admission 
examination in 1827. 

Fifty years later he wrote of his two principal 
teachers at Exeter Academy : — 

" Dr. Abbot was then, and continued for thirteen 
years afterwards to be, at the head of the insti- 
tution. He had been associated with very able 
and accomplished assistant instructors, — men who 
as teachers and in other walks held the highest 
posts of usefulness and honor. But, while with 
him, they spontaneously looked up to him as their 
superior, not only in official dignity, but in the 
easy and natural ascendency which he maintained 
in the government of the school. Outside of that, 
as a neighbor, a citizen, or a friend, he was appar- 
ently the meekest of men, diffident, hesitating, dis- 
trustful of himself. But no admiral on the quarter- 
deck of his flagship was, more than he in his 
school, the impersonation of decision, firmness, and 
authority. 

" The personal influence of a great teacher is 
greater than anything that he says or does. It 
gives that a meaning which it cannot have in itself. 
When Dr. Abbot entered the Academy yard, or 
lifted his hat, as he did to every student he met, it 
was as if the benignant spirit of a Christian gentle- 
man diffused itself visibly around him, and gently 
touched the boy's mind with a new sense of per- 
sonal dignity and kindness. 

" Mr. Soule as an assistant teacher filled his post 



EARLY LIFE 47 

modestly and grandly. . . . When I was admitted 
to the Academy in 1825, Mr. Soule was twenty- 
nine years old. In his gait and personal appear- 
ance, in his bearing towards the students and his 
mode of teaching, as well as in the tones of his voice, 
he was then very much the same that he always 
was afterwards. There was nothing like self-asser- 
tion in his demeanor. He moved and spoke calmly 
and deliberately. I do not remember that I ever 
saw him out of temper. But there was something 
about him which gave the impression that, while 
he was both quick and exact in his mental opera- 
tions, he was also equally quick in his feelings, and 
that he was a man with whom it would not be safe 
to take any undue liberties. I never saw a flash, 
but we all felt that the lightning was there, ready 
to check at the instant any approach to disobedi- 
ence or disrespect." 

The feelings with which Mr. Mori son regarded 
his early life are perhaps shown best in his own 
words written in his Class Book at the time of 
his graduation in 1831 : — 

"My life has been marked by few uncommon 
incidents, and a short notice is all that it deserves. 
I was born in Peterboro', N. H., July 25, a. d. 1808. 
Like most of my classmates, I went to school in my 
childhood, and like some of my classmates got my 
full share of ferulings and floggings. Until large 
enough ' to ride the horse to plough ' (so we country- 
folks talk) I was allowed to go to school nearly six 
months in a year, but after that my school time 
was restricted to 10 or 12 weeks a year. I lived 



48 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

at home, in the delightful occupation of farming 
(which the poets bless more than I did), till I was 
12 years old, when, in consequence of the death 
of my father, I was ' put out to work,' and so con- 
tinued for five years. This was a most unhappy 
period of my life ; never could a poor creature feel 
more desolate. I still look back upon it with feel- 
ings very similar to those which Satan must have 
experienced when he looked back from the garden 
of Eden to the chaotic regions through which he 
had so recently passed. But my time was not un- 
profitably spent, for besides earning enough to 
feed and clothe me, and at the same time going 
through a severe moral discipline, I also derived no 
small enjoyment from books. The shreds and 
patches of time which I had at my command, and 
they were few and small, were almost entirely 
devoted to reading, and I can truly say that at no 
subsequent time have I been able to read with so 
high a relish. The scraps which I then read (for 
even very long works were devoured by piecemeal) 
were, like the choice bits of a beggar's fare, good 
in themselves and doubly good on account of their 
scantiness. But, after all this was rather irritating 
than otherwise, like a deficiency of bed-clothes in a 
cold night, keeping one in constant motion. Still 
the exercise was sufficient to prevent drowsiness, 
and to keep up a spirit of activity which might have 
been destroyed, and succeeded by a general lan- 
guor, if bodily functions had been in a measure suf- 
focated by too great an abundance of clothing. We 
know that those who in early life have been obliged 
to dig (with a shovel, I mean) for a livelihood are 



EARLY LIFE 49 

afterwards much more likely to be debilitated by 
sedentary pursuits than those who have been 
brought up without bodily labor. May it not be 
that those who in early years have but little time 
to read, and few books, are more likely than others 
to be sated and confused when they may spend 
their whole time in this way with an army of books 
at their disposal ? Be this as it may, I am certainly 
ashamed to compare my present ardor for literary 
pursuits, and my present proficiency in them, with 
what I felt when destitute of all means of following 
them. 

" In 1824 I was led to Exeter, N. H., by some 
strange fatality for which I never could account ; 
for to a person of my views and habits no honest 
situation on earth could be more humiliating or 
more unpleasant. Still I had evenings to myself 
and candles. I had no opportunity of associating 
on equal terms with reasonable beings, and there- 
fore kept entirely by myself, improving my leisure 
time to the best of my ability and knowledge. But 
night is darkest towards the dawn. After having 
been in this unsocial and desponding state for 
nearly a year, by the kindness of friends I was 
admitted into the Academy as a charity student. 
Here I remained three years as a student and one 
in the mixed character of student and instructor. 
I passed the time pleasantly and I hope with profit. 
Many of my most valuable and most valued friend- 
ships were here formed, and I look back to my 
instructors and benefactors with no small degree 
of affection and gratitude." 



50 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

With his removal from Exeter the first period 
of Mr. Morison's life may be considered closed. 
He had attained his majority, and had joined his 
class in Harvard College at the beginning of the 
Junior year. He had passed through a period of 
hardship and struggle, and had reached his place 
among educated associates. Those who knew him 
only as a mature man will be surprised to learn 
that in his native town, and even after going to 
Exeter, he was regarded as one of the greatest 
fighters among the boys with whom he associated ; 
at Exeter he fought his boy for the last time, and 
determined then that he would never do it again. 

All four of his brothers followed him to Exeter 
Academy. The five were a stalwart set of country 
boys ; Judge Smith called them the thirty feet of 
Morison. Three more brothers entered and were 
graduated at Harvard College. 1 The list of Har- 
vard graduates to-day shows eleven Morisons, four 
of the first and seven of the second generation, 
while two of the third generation are already on 
the college rolls. They are all of this one family, 
and but for him it is not probable that the name 
would have had any representation. The educa- 
tion of the younger sister was also due to him. 

1 Horace Morison, 1837 ; Nathaniel Holmes Morison, 1839 ; 
James Morison, 1S44. 



Ill 

EARLY MANHOOD 

Mr. Morison spent but little more than a year 
in Harvard College. He joined his class at the 
beginning of the Junior year, and besides the ab- 
sences of the regular vacations he kept school both 
winters, — in the Junior year at Lexington, Mass., 
and in the Senior year at Northborough, Mass. 
Among his classmates were John Lothrop Motley 
and Wendell Phillips ; his chum was Edgar Buck- 
ingham, who also became a Unitarian minister ; 
his special friend was George Cheyne Shattuck, 
with whom a most affectionate intimacy contin- 
ued, in spite of different occupations and very dif- 
ferent religious views, for more than sixty years. 
An unfortunate quarrel occurred in the class dur- 
ing the Senior year, which led to estrangements 
that prevented the holding of a class meeting till 
many years after graduation. It is said that at 
the meeting, when the class officers were chosen, 
Morison was the chairman on the ground that he 
was the only member who was on speaking terms 
with all his classmates. He was graduated the 






52 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

third scholar in his class. Forty-five years later he 
wrote of his college life : — 

" In August, 1829, I was admitted to the Junior 
Class in Harvard College. Of the hundred dol- 
lars which I had saved from my earnings during 
the previous year, I was required to pay ninety for 
instruction which I had not been able to receive 
during the Freshman and Sophomore years of my 
class. 1 But, notwithstanding this exaction, which 
always seemed to me unjust, I have every reason 
to speak of my Alma Mater with grateful affec- 
tion and respect. The last generation of American 
statesmen numbered among its distinguished men 
no grander example of a faithful, disinterested, 
able public man than Josiah Quincy, then Presi- 
dent of Harvard University. He was kind to me 
from the beginning, and his kindness continued 
down to the last year of his useful and honored 
life. I taught school during six of the twenty-four 
months of my college course, so that I was really 
in college a little less than a year and a half. I 
earned what little I could, and practiced a pretty 
severe economy. My expenses were small, and 
Judge Smith had generously and very judiciously 
so arranged matters that I never felt any great 
anxiety in regard to my immediate wants. I began 
life with nothing. I never have asked pecuniary 
assistance for myself, and yet I have never been 
unable to meet my engagements. Sometimes I 

1 Payment for advanced standing, a species of protective tariff 
abolished in 1870. 



EARLY MANHOOD 53 

could not see a month beforehand how the means 
could be procured, but they always came, and 
sometimes from the most unexpected sources. 

" On graduating in 1831, I concluded to study 
law, having engaged to pursue my studies with a 
very learned lawyer of Baltimore, and to meet my 
expenses by instructing his two children. On ac- 
count of this engagement I declined several advan- 
tageous offers of employment as a teacher. After 
waiting several weeks, when the time for such 
offers had passed by, the gentleman sent me word 
that he had engaged another young man and would 
not need my services. This was a very great disap- 
pointment to me. It left me without occupation 
and without means of support, but it taught me a 
lesson as to the sacredness of engagements that has 
always been of great service to me." 1 

So far as he had any plans, his idea both at Exe- 
ter and at college had been to study law. In 
Exeter he used to attend court with the feeling 
that he might some time be himself at the bar. 

During his Senior year, in May, 1831, he took a 
journey, largely on foot, through the Connecticut 
valley, going from Cambridge to Northampton and 
thence following up the valley to Hanover, N. H., 
returning from Hanover to Peterborough. He 
kept a separate journal of this trip, which is inter- 
esting principally from the account it gives of the 
two colleges which he visited, Amherst and Dart- 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 188*. 



54 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

mouth. It was not long after the division of New 
England Congregationalism into the Unitarian 
and Trinitarian sections, and at Amherst he found 
a revival in progress, and both professors and 
students specially bitter towards Harvard College. 
At Hanover he seems to have been very kindly 
received by some of his old Exeter schoolmates, 
but he finally concluded : — 

" The more I see and hear of other colleges, the 
more I am disposed to be satisfied with my own ; 
for with all her faults she has more virtues and 
fewer failings than any other institution of the 
kind which I know anything about. At any rate, 
she is free from religious and political intolerance, 
and this is no small thing." 

In the summer vacation he made another trip, 
on which he kept a diary. Leaving Boston on the 
22d of July, he went by stage to Portland, where 
he spent three days at the house of Rev. Dr. Nich- 
ols, and then went on to Warren, where he visited 
Jerusha F. Morison, the daughter of his grand- 
father's younger brother, Thomas. She took him 
in a chaise to Belfast, and his brief description of 
their parting is quite pathetic : — 

" There I parted with my favorite cousin, whom 
I never expect to see again ; for she is far, very far 
gone in a consumption, the curse of our family, and 
the general scourge of the young, the fair, the 
learned, and the good." 



EARLY MANHOOD 55 

He probably bad in mind the family of his rela- 
tive, Judge Smith. On the way back he visited 
Bowdoin College. 

After graduating, Mr. Morison kept for several 
years what may perhaps be called a journal, but 
was more in the nature of a commonplace book. 
It contained essays on various subjects, some origi- 
nal and some copied, and much matter which, 
though indicating the condition of his mind at that 
time, was not such as he would have wished to see 
perpetuated. A few extracts show the progress of 
his life : — 

" November 3, 1831. A fortnight ago last Mon- 
day (October 17) I commenced a private school in 
this place. I have but nine scholars [boys], and 
my salary probably will not exceed $400. I board 
at Dr. Ware's, and have a room at Rev. H. Ware, 
Jr.'s. I yesterday removed to my lodgings, and 
take advantage of the present epoch in my life to 
commence a journal of myself and my thoughts. 

" I never in my life passed a fortnight of greater 
perplexity than the last fortnight, having been 
wholly undecided as to my future profession. I 
know not that I have a natural aptitude for any 
particular profession, and from the first I have 
avoided following out any course of study which 
should fit me for one rather than another of the 
learned professions. The consequence is that I 
am now prepared for no course of action. I am 
free to choose the path, but have the whole way 



56 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

to clear out before me. And with all this I am 
perfectly satisfied, notwithstanding the extreme 
perplexity into which it has thrown me. I have 
pursued the great road which leads through the 
metropolis of learning, satisfied with the riches 
offered in its storehouses, without prying into the 
narrow lanes, secret avenues, and unfrequented 
marts which are interspersed through the vast 
city. I durst not trust my inexperienced feet in 
these places, lest, being dazzled by novelty, per- 
plexed by variety, sated by abundance, and seduced 
by trifles, my senses corrupted, my mind bewil- 
dered, and my strength exhausted, I should no 
longer be able to see the right way, to choose it 
when seen, or follow it when chosen. 

" Thus far I have followed the main path, but 
have now come to a place where ' three ways meet.' 
One of these I must choose, and I am pausing a 
while to consider. This is the source of my per- 
plexity. 

" Medicine is out of the question. My prepos- 
sessions are almost entirely in favor of divinity, but 
my conscience will not allow me rashly to enter 
upon it. I am a moral but not a religious per- 
son. I have thought much of religion and its all- 
engrossing topics ; many of the most happy mo- 
ments of my life have been employed in the con- 
templation of its truths. Still I am not habitu- 
ally a religious person. My wayward, wandering 
thoughts do not always revert to religion as to the 
great object of their attention ; and when engaged 
in the affairs of this world — its pleasures, studies, 



EARLY MANHOOD 57 

and pursuits — my mind docs not fondly recur to 
God, his perfections, attributes, and works, as the 
mind of the exile recurs to his ' fatherland,' the 
scenes of his early years, the friends of his happi- 
est days. 

" Still I must do something. And may not 
much, nay everything-, be done by a prayerful, seri- 
ous, contemplative life ? I will try the experiment. 
This year shall be passed in religious studies, and 
if by the smiles of Providence I shall succeed in 
establishing a religious character — religious habits 
of thought, feeling, and action — I shall study 
divinity. Otherwise laiv, with its dry details and 
intricate folds, will be my profession. 

" In the mean time I am to attend as many exer- 
cises of the Divinity School as my own school will 
allow, and at the end of the year be one year ad- 
vanced in the studies thereof. 

" November 9, 1831. For the three months last 
past I have had, I think, my full share of little per- 
plexities. August 29th I engaged to go to Bal- 
timore as a private tutor. . . . After waiting at 
Peterborough three weeks for further information, 
I learnt that another arrangement had been made, 
. . . and that my services were not wanted. Where- 
upon I forthwith proceeded to Cambridge in quest 
of a school. Friends, whom I supposed well ac- 
quainted with the thing, strongly advised me to 
apply for the situation of principal in the Boston 
Latin School. I therefore mustered what recom- 
mendations I could and besieged the place, but 



58 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

was repulsed cum magno dedecore. What was now 
to be done ? It was too late in the season to expect 
a profitable school, and I must be about something 
or starve. A small school in Cambridge, with an 
income large enough to support me, was at my ser- 
vice, and I heedlessly engaged it, and in it am now 
employed. 

• •••••••• 

"February 12, 1832. About three weeks ago 
President Quincy read to me a portion of a letter 
from Rev. Mr. Dewey, of New Bedford, stating 
explicitly and without any reservation that he (Mr. 
D.) wished to procure an instructor for a small 
female school, with a salary of 81,000, and re- 
questing Mr. Quincy to recommend to him some 
gentleman for the situation. Accordingly Mr. 
Quincy recommended me, and his letter was sec- 
onded by another from Rev. H. Ware, Jr. I, 
of course, felt pretty sure of the place ; but after 
waiting till I was tired, without getting any infor- 
mation, I was this evening informed that the good 
people of New Bedford hardly knew what they 
wanted, and that they would probably conclude to 
have a preceptress." 

The good people of New Bedford were not so 
uncertain as this entry would imply. There was a 
little delay, but two months later Mr. Morison 
went to New Bedford and began this school. 
While the school lasted only about a year, it opened 
his life to new and gratifying relations, and was 


















EARLY MANHOOD 59 

the beginning of one of the happiest portions of 
his life. 

" February 13. I have been this evening exam- 
ined for admission into the Theological School. 
For some time past I have regularly attended the 
exercises, and after much perplexity, much deep 
feeling and anxious prayer, I have at length con- 
cluded to make divinity my profession. I feel the 
responsibleness of the step, and with hojje and 
trembling am ready to meet it, praying that a kind 
Father will pardon my errors, supply my deficien- 
cies, and nourish within me that purity of heart 
and simplicity of purpose for which all in this call- 
ing should be distinguished. 

" June 30. It is more than three months since 
I wrote a word in this book. For the last two 
months and more (since April 13) I have been 
in New Bedford teaching a little female school. 
During this time I have been little disposed either 
to read, write, or to think. I am, upon the whole, 
pleased with my school. Some days it drags heav- 
ily along, but some days I really enjoy myself. It 
is delightful to instruct pupils who have minds and 
dispositions for improvement, and such I trust is 
the case with at least some of my pupils. 

" July 1. The commencement of a new week 
and a new month. I have this morning heard a 
most admirable sermon from Mr. Dewey on the 
necessity of religion to supply the wants and sat- 
isfy the cravings of our nature. 



60 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" It is communion day. In this ordinance I 
have never joined. But is it not time ? Is it not 
my duty to attach myself to some church ? I feel 
— that is, I felt — a guilty consciousness weighing 
upon me to-day as I was leaving the Lord's Sup- 
per to be celebrated by others. 

" I often detect in myself a disposition to pur- 
sue a blind and headlong course. I feel convinced 
of the importance of a duty and of its imperative 
character. I cannot justify to myself the neglect 
of it. And yet from month to month I blindly go 
on, thinking of it with pain, but without deter- 
mining no longer to disregard it. It is the power 
of wrong feelings over right principles." 

This last entry was made five months after he 
had decided on his profession and entered the Di- 
vinity School. In the following month he joined 
the Peterborough church. The records of the 
Congregational Church in Peterborough show that 
John H. Morison and his sister Eliza became com- 
municants on the 26th of August, 1832. 

In the brief autobiography before quoted, he 
says : — 

" In March, 1832, I began to teach a small pri- 
vate school for young ladies in New Bedford, and 
remained there a year. That year was perhaps 
the most important in my life. I was then for the 
first time a man among men. I had leisure for 
study, and devoted myself to it with the utmost 
intensity and enthusiasm. I read Cicero's philo- 



EARLY MANHOOD 61 

sophical writings, Cousin, Pascal, Madame de Stael, 
Dante, some of the old English prose-writers, 
Wordsworth, and, above all in its influence on my 
mind, Coleridge, especially his ' Friend ' and ' Bi- 
ographia Literaria.' In the winter I gave a course 
of seven lectures on literary subjects to a very in- 
telligent audience of perhaps a hundred persons. 
This was a new and exciting experience. It made 
me feel the responsibility of acting on the minds of 
others. . . . Among the great advantages which I 
enjoyed at New Bedford, especially in the society 
of very intelligent people, that which I valued 
above all the rest was the privilege of hearing Dr. 
Dewey preach. It was the most quickening and 
uplifting preaching that I have ever heard, and of 
itself made an epoch in my life." * 

Quoting again from the journal : — 

"November 11. I have just come from hearing 
an excellent discourse from Mr. Dewey on the reply 
of Nathan to David, ' Thou art the man.' The 
sermon was exceedingly strong, beautiful, and 
striking. The leading object was to show the 
insufficiency of religious . . . sentiments, which 
are like the northern lights that wane and flash in 
beauty and rise up in brilliant coruscations, give 
little light and no heat. The imagination is en- 
gaged, bright visions flit around it, but the heart 
is cold as the north pole. Religious . . . senti- 
ments have their end. They are like holy oil 
poured upon the ocean. They smooth the surface 
and calm its apparent agitations, but the depths 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 189*. 



62 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

are unaffected. They may be restless and turbid. 
Again, they are like the morning cloud gilded by 
the rising sunbeams and picturing forth fair and 
lovely visions. But we walk not upon these clouds. 
They do not influence our lives. The earth, its 
rugged paths and trying scenes, — these are the 
ways and the objects of our thoughts and actions, 
and if religion exists at all it must exist here and 
follow us through all our employments. There 
are many who cry, ' How beauteous are the feet 
of those who bring glad tidings ! ' as they stand 
at a distance upon the mountains. Their counte- 
nances and their garbs beam with loveliness. But 
when they come near and proclaim the nature of 
their message, they are stern, unbending, rigid in 
their demands and rigid in their appearance. 1 

1 Dr. Dewey was one of those great preachers who write few 
sermons, but those which he wrote were revised and preached 
over and over again. In the early spring of 1846 he was in Wash- 
ington, and one Sunday while there he preached in the Hall of 
Representatives. This sermon, on the Difference between Reli- 
gious Principles and Sentiments, was the one which he selected 
for that occasion. A Washington gentleman often spoke of it 
as the most eloquent and effective sermon he ever heard. The 
preacher read with wonderful power the story of David and Na- 
than, and followed it with this discourse. The bequest of Joseph 
Smithson for " founding at Washington an institution for the 
increase and diffusion of knowledge among men " had been the 
subject of debate in Congress session after session for nearly ten 
years, and various bills had been reported, but no one had been 
favorably received by Congress. 

The day following Dr. Dewey's service, Robert Dale Owen, 
Chairman of the Select Committee, in reporting a new bill, made 
an impressive speech in which he condemned the dilatoriness of 
Congress in wasting ten years in fruitless discussion, and referred 
in the following words to this sermon : " I impute not to an Amer- 



EARLY MANHOOD 63 

" I cannot hear such a man as Dr. Dewey with- 
out a mixture of pain in my feelings. His trem- 
bling', agitated countenance shows that he is wear- 
ing himself out in his calling, — that he will be 
just as much a martyr to the cause of Christianity 
as the holy men of old who ended their lives upon 
the cross or at the stake." 

Meanwhile the vigorous constitution of the coun- 
try boy had begun to feel the effects of privations 
and overwork. In November, 1831, his diary re- 
fers to a bad state of the blood, and a cough which 
had tormented him more or less for nine months. 
In March, 1833, he gave up his school at New 
Bedford, went to his mother's house in Peterbor- 
ough, and remained there till late in the summer 
in a state of physical exhaustion which he did not 
understand. With the beginning of the new col- 

ican Congress, I attribute not to any of my fellow-members, the 
deliberate intention to neglect the objects of this trust. There 
is, doubtless there always has been, a right feeling on this sub- 
ject. The just cause of complaint is, that this right feeling, like 
many other good intentions in this world, has never ripened into 
action. When you feel nobly and intend well, go and do some- 
thing ! Do some good ; it avails nothing merely to think about 
it. Such were the words pronounced from yonder desk by a 
teacher whose impressive eloquence recently filled this hall. I 
thought of the Smithsonian bequest when I heard them." With 
a few more eloquent words, Mr. Owen closed what has been called 
one of the ablest speeches made during the years of the discussion 
of this bequest. With very little more debate the bill was passed. 
The gentleman who related the incident said that Dr. Dewey's 
sermon was one of the most potent factors in accomplishing this 
result. 



64 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

legiate year he returned to Cambridge and rejoined 
his class in the Divinity School. Of this period he 
writes : — 

" At the beginning of the academical year 1833 
I joined the middle class at the Cambridge Divin- 
ity School, which was then under the able and con- 
scientious charge of John Gorham Palfrey and the 
Henry Wares, father and son. There was an 
extraordinary degree of vitality and enthusiasm in 
the school at that time, especially in regard to 
philanthropical movements. I entered very heart- 
ily into these subjects, and took an earnest part in 
the preparation of elaborate papers, and in the 
debates. Both my moral convictions and my phi- 
losophy went much deeper, and looked to a much 
more thorough and radical reform than was usu- 
ally contemplated in the social movements of the 
day. I was, perhaps, considered too conservative, 
because I was in fact too radical to be satisfied 
with the superficial measures that were suggested 
by the most zealous reformers. The labor ques- 
tion, which is just beginning to cast its portentous 
shadows before it now, was one on which I pre- 
pared a report that cost a vast amount of labor, 
and which came to conclusions that are now begin- 
ning to engage the attention of thoughtful men. 
During a temporary vacancy in the department, I 
taught political economy to the Senior Class of 
undergraduates, and read nearly everything that 
had then been published on that great but still in- 
complete science. I prepared two lectures for the 



EARLY MANHOOD 65 

Exeter Lyceum, and did not slight my studies in 
the Divinity School. In this way I overtasked 
my physical powers. In May, 1834, 1 had a slight 
attack of typhoid fever, with a determination of 
blood to the head. After two or three weeks I 
went to my mother's in Peterborough. But the 
disease did not leave me. I spent nearly a year 
in a dark room, unable to sit up, or to bear the 
presence even of a near friend. A strong consti- 
tution was seriously broken. For thirty years 
afterwards I was not able to do more than one 
third the amount of mental labor which had once 
been a healthful and happy exercise. This was a 
constantly recurring grief and disappointment." 1 

During the year in the Divinity School the jour- 
nal contains only thoughts and essays, there being 
no narratives of his life. There is no entry of any 
kind from July 27, 1834, to May 10, 1836, when 
he writes as follows : — 

" May 10, 1836. For the last two years I have 
been not even a spectator in the world. One year 
of entire seclusion from men and books and one 
year of a sickly and imperfect intercourse have 
nearly passed by. Yet, in all, my heavenly Father 
has not forsaken me. He has kindly supplied my 
wants. He has provided the best of friends, nor 
have I been wanting in anything which the world 
can give. And for the blessings which the world 
cannot give or take away I trust that I am not un- 
grateful. They have borne me up under the sever- 

1 History of Peterborough, 190*. 



66 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

est trials of sickness, and have rendered the near 
prospect of death not only cheering- but inviting. 
Oh, who that has once felt their soothing, consol- 
ing, animating power could give up the hopes and 
comforts of religion for all that avarice would seek 
or ambition grasp ? 

" I remember an evening in November, 1834. 
For a month I had been shut up in darkness, and 
had seen no object of nature. My brain and ner- 
vous system were in the most excitable state, and I 
was unable to bear the presence even of a sister in 
my room. But in the twilight of a beautiful even- 
ing in our Indian Summer I was allowed to sit up 
a few minutes, and the curtains were removed from 
a pane of glass so that I could see a small spot of 
ground and a portion of the sky : that spot was 
the place of my birth, connected in my mind and 
endeared to my heart by the dreams, sports, and 
companions of my childhood ; and how easy the 
transition from the earth, which in the dim twilight 
gradually melted into the blue sky, — how easy the 
transition from the earth where life began to the 
heaven where I hoped soon to renew the life which 
then seemed faintly glimmering in the socket ! The 
frosts of November had destroyed the verdure of 
the field sv and its cold blasts had swept away the 
foliage of the maples, whose long, bare arms were 
stretched out as if to struggle with the storms of 
winter. The earth bore marks of death, and the 
evening, too, like the grave, was closing in, as if to 
hide from our view the widespread tokens of des- 
olation. But mild lights from above, like hopes 



EARLY MANHOOD 67 

from heaven amid the dark trials of life, softened 
the asperity of the scene ; and the earth and trees, 
naked, bleak, and barren as they were, spoke of 
the resurrection which was to ensue. This sketch, 
with its reflections, may seem fanciful. But to me 
they were all reality, and I would not exchange 
those moments, with the hours of happy meditation 
to which they have given birth, for the proudest 
hour of a conqueror's career." 

During this long illness he was kept at his mo- 
ther's house, cared for by his mother and sisters, 
but with medical attendance which failed to appre- 
ciate the case. At length he was visited by " that 
great physician and excellent man, Dr. Amos 
Twitchell," of Keene, and from that time he began 
to improve ; throughout his life he regarded this 
man as the ideal physician. This long illness prac- 
tically closed the second period of his life. The 
country boy who had grown into a stalwart man, 
and, when the glories of an education had been 
opened to him, had tried to do double work, was for 
the next thirty years to be a delicate invalid, sel- 
dom able to do more than half the amount of a 
man's full work. From this time it was always 
his habit to spend two or three hours every day 
lying down. He preached his first sermon in Feb- 
ruary, 1836, in his native town. 

Those who knew him best felt that the work 



68 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

which he did was much more than it is the privi- 
lege of many men to perform ; but this work was 
largely done through the influences which he 
always exerted on others, rather than by the steady 
hours of toil which had been his method as a 
younger man. 



IV 

NEW BEDFORD 

In May, 1836, the journal was resumed, and, be- 
sides essays and thoughts, it again contains a nar- 
rative. He was now preaching, but not a candi- 
date for settlement. He was at Exeter, in the house 
of his friend, Hon. Jeremiah Smith, who had gone 
with Mrs. Smith on a journey through Virginia to 
Kentucky and Ohio. The judge had married in 
1831 a lady much younger than himself, who was 
the mother of the present Hon. Jeremiah Smith, 
and a woman whose whole life was devoted to the 
highest ideals. 

"May 15, Sunday morning. May this be a 
day good for my soul ! May not the annoying 
thoughts of the world find place in my heart, but 
may I this and every day live a godly, righteous, 
and sober life ! How little are our Sabbaths what 
they should be ! With many, they are hardly more 
than days of animal torpor ; with some, days of tri- 
fling amusement. To how few are they days of 
rest and refreshment to the weary soul ! To how 
few, days of solemn self-examination and prayer ! 

" May 16. As yesterday was to my mind a very 
exciting, so to-day is a very stupid day, and I am 



70 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

glad to have my mind, which for some days past 
has been laboring under too great activity, become 
more sluggish and inactive. I have to-day received 
from Mr. Swain a letter inviting me to spend the 
summer at Naushon, which I have engaged to do, 
provided that an engagement with Dr. Channing 
at Newport should not interfere. 

" May 22. I came four weeks ago from Boston. 
The preceding Sabbath I had preached at Provi- 
dence, — one of the most uncomfortable days I had 
ever passed, — and the three Sabbaths previous at 
Boston, the two before at Keene, N. H. ; and these, 
with the exception of half a day in February at 
Peterborough, and the first day in May at Dover, 
are the only days on which I have preached. 
Heaven grant that if I am to continue in the min- 
istry I may be able to perform my duties with 
more comfort and satisfaction ! I was oppressed 
by every subject on which I wrote, and came into 
the pulpit with such a sense of weakness that I 
almost rejoiced when increased debility obliged me 
to leave the pulpit. I came here four weeks ago, 
with spirits more depressed than they have been 
for years, and with mind more troubled and per- 
plexed. But solitude and repose have been grad- 
ually restoring my equanimity, and my health is 
considerably improved and improving. 

" My friends, and more than friends, Judge and 
Mrs. Smith, at whose house I am, are absent on a 
two months' excursion to the West. They went 
Tuesday, 10 th of May, and since then I have been 



NEW BEDFORD 71 

entirely alone. But I love solitude. It is, in my 
case at least, the best restorative for a troubled 
spirit, and it has not often been my lot to enjoy 
more in the same time than during - the past week. 
Books, though I can read but little ; writing, though 
here I am more limited ; meditation and prayer, 
— these, with the leaves which are just peeping 
out from their winter prisons, and the birds which 
seem as if bringing tidings of a happier land, the 
sun and skies, which, after a winter of almost un- 
precedented severity, are once more smiling upon 
us, have altogether given a delightful occupation to 
the mind. I ride much on horseback, and should 
have set out for Peterborough last Thursday, but 
a kick from my horse on Wednesday evening dis- 
abled me for a day or two, and I have for the 
present given up the journey. But here I am, hap- 
pily provided with everything that can do me good. 
My trials and feeling enlarge the bounds of my 
sympathy, and will, I hope, have their use in the 
field to which I am called. Or if not, they may at 
least have a useful and permanent influence upon 
my own mind and heart. 

" Father of Spirits, thou best knowest what I 
need, and, whether it be prosperity or adversity, 
things joyous or grievous, give me grace so to re- 
ceive thy righteous dispensations that all may work 
together for my spiritual and everlasting good. If 
it be best that I should be humbled in the dust, 
and constrained to drink the cup of sorrow and 
depression, thy will — may I say it with a sincere 
heart ! — thy will, O God, be done. Grant me 



72 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

that godly repentance which is not to be repented 
of ; give me firmer principles of duty, stronger aspi- 
rations after holiness, a higher faith and a purer 
love. May I in all things recognize thy gracious 
hand, and so live that death may find me, through 
thy grace, a worthy object of thy pardoning mercy ! 
Through Jesus Christ. Amen. 

" June 2. The twenty-four preceding pages have 
been written at Exeter during the last three weeks. 
I have been wholly alone at the house of my early 
and late benefactor, Judge Smith, who, with Mrs. 
S., is on a journey to the South and West. Heaven 
go with them, and restore them in safety to their 
home, which has been to me a home indeed. It 
has seldom been my lot to enjoy more in the same 
length of time than during the three weeks which 
have just closed. 

" This morning I am to leave Exeter ; to spend 
two or three days in Boston ; then two or three at 
New Bedford ; and the summer at Naushon, with 
my excellent friend, Mr. Swain. My health has 
been rapidly gaining : quiet and exercise, with a 
pure air and simple diet, gentle exercise of the men- 
tal faculties, and a happy employment of the affec- 
tions are to me the great restoratives. God grant 
that a life which has already been so singularly 
blessed by his goodness may not be spent in vain ! 
But he best knows what is right ; his will be done. 

" Naushon, June 16. I left Exeter June 2 ; 
stayed three days in Boston at the house of the 



NEW BEDFORD 73 

best of physicians and friends, Dr. Shattuck, to 
whom I feel under greater obligations than to any 
other man except my long-tried benefactor, Judge 
Smith. Monday, June Gth, I came to New Bed- 
ford, where I remained until Friday (10th), when 
I came in a packet to Naushon. My health suf- 
fered considerably from the excitement of the 
journey, and I have now not more than half the 
strength I had when I left Exeter. But I am 
recruiting. Everything - here seems favorable to 
my objects, and I hope by autumn to enter upon 
my profession with a goodly amount of strength, 
though in this hope I am by no means sanguine." 

Dr. Shattuck was the father of his classmate 
who bore the same name : the words in the journal 
express but a small portion of the feeling with 
which Mr. Morison regarded him ; after his death 
in 1854 Mr. Morison said, in a notice of him in 
the " Christian Register " : " We have known men 
of greater intellectual attainments, of more nicely 
balanced characters, and with fewer failings, but 
we never have known a more generous or a better 
man." 

Mr. Swain was a retired merchant of New Bed- 
ford, whose family, besides himself, consisted of 
his wife, a most refined lady of the Quaker type, 
and a crippled son. Some years before, Mr. Swain 
and Mr. John M. Forbes had purchased Naushon, 
the largest of the Elizabeth Islands, which from 



74 JOHN HOPKINS M OKI SON 

that time forward was Mr. Swain's summer home. 
The island had originally been owned by Governor 
Bowdoin, and the purchase carried the title to Mr. 
Swain, who from that time was called Governor by 
his friends. While the habits of Naushon life 
were always simple, the guests entertained there 
included some of the country's most famous men. 
The relations which Mr. Morison bore to Dr. Shat- 
tuck and to Governor Swain were shown by the 
fact that he named his two sons for Dr. Shattuck 
and for Governor Swain's son Robert. 

He remained at Naushon till the middle of Sep- 
tember, and the following extracts from the jour- 
nal trace the course of his life and mind : — 

" August 3, 1836. I last Sunday preached at 
New Bedford in the morning. It was the first 
time that I have ever felt happy in the pulpit. 

"The doctrine of a Divine Providence as taught 
by Jesus is to be found in no system of philosophy 
or established religion. Submission to the Divine 
Will has, indeed, been taught. The Mahometan 
submits, but it is as the atheist submits to a harsh 
and unyielding fatality. So taught the Stoics. 
Socrates had a glimpse of something better, but 
that was all. He submitted to his fate, with the 
hope that all would end happily ; but with the feel- 
ing also that he must submit to what was unavoid- 
able. Look at the consolations of Cicero, with all 
the stores of ancient philosophy and religion in 






NEW BEDFORD 75 

his reach. It is the doom of all — such is his 
most frequent source of comfort — it is the doom 
of all to fade, to suffer, to perish. Cities and 
nations even decay ; why, then, should I, an indi- 
vidual, complain, or shrink from my fate ? They 
who carried these points farthest did not hold to the 
unnatural doctrine that there is no pain, — that suf- 
ferings are a matter of indifference. It was Jesus 
alone who turned our sufferings, trials, sorrows, 
nay, death and the grave, — into a triumph. He 
first taught the sanctifying power of afflictions. He 
first taught that they are the merciful provision of 
a kind Father ; that tribulations are to be counted 
as gain, because through them we are to enter the 
kingdom of heaven ; that God is ever present with 
us, and, though He suffers us to be afflicted, yet if 
we but look to Him He will turn our sorrows into 
rejoicing. He may not remove the galling thorn, 
but a voice from heaven answers, ' My grace is 
sufficient for thee ; my strength is made perfect in 
weakness.' 

" August 7, Sunday. My health not very good, 
but my mind is filled more and more with a desire 
of being able to be of some service to my fellow- 
men. I do not regret my illness. It has been the 
instrument of great good to my heart. At times, 
however, I almost lose all hope of ever having 
strength to go into the vineyard of Christ ; and 
when my mind is most active and my heart most 
full, then is the weakness of the body most appar- 
ent. But something at such times — is it con- 



76 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

ceit ? — something tells me that I have yet a great 
work to perform on earth ; that in proportion to 
the magnitude of the work must be the difficulty 
of preparation ; and that my present long-contin- 
ued discipline is the best possible means of prepa- 
ration for what is before me. So be it, Lord. I 
would not rush into the field, though the harvest 
be indeed plenteous. I feel that one or even many 
years more may be most profitably spent in my 
present retirement from the active pursuits of life. 
I have much — oh, how much have I ! — yet to 
learn. O God, sanctify to me the discipline of thy 
providence. I would yield in all things to thee. 
Make me but a child of thine. Give me the spirit 
of my Master, — a spirit which will fit me alike to 
live or die, to labor with zeal and love and pru- 
dence, to leave all with hope and joy and faith. 
Thy will, — may it be mine, — thy will be done. 

" September 2. Received a letter from Dr. Chan- 
ning, saying that his son had returned from Europe, 
and that he would be glad to have me with him at 
Newport as soon as might be consistent with my 
engagements. I shall, I think, go in a fortnight. 

" September 13. I to-day left Naushon, where I 
have spent a most delightful summer. I cannot feel 
under too great obligations to my friends, Mr. and 
Mrs. Swain for all their kindness during the sea- 
son. Not one unpleasant incident has occurred. . . . 

" September 14. Came from New Bedford to 
Newport, where I found Dr. Channing quite sick, 



NEW BEDFORD 77 

— for four days unable to sit up. He speaks with 
difficulty. His mind is clear and strong, cheerful 
and happy. He says it tries him to find that his 
voice does not correspond to his feelings, — that 
when his feelings are even sportive his voice seems 
plaintive, as though he sunk under sickness and 
improperly gave way to it. 

" September 15. Dr. Channing had last night 
little rest, and that little confused. He remarked 
this morning that he had seemed lost in the abyss 
of the infinite, and that on awaking it was difficult 
to recover the feeling of personal identity. ' How 
little,' he added, ' do we know of the field of suf- 
fering, and how slow to learn even from expe- 
rience ! ' After this he spoke clearly, though with 
some difficulty, of the studies of his son. I have 
never seen a human soul wrapt up in so slender a 
fold of mortality, — and such a soul ! shining out 
with clearness and force, as it were, from the very 
leanness and frailty of death. The little portion 
of flush which he usually has is wholly gone ; his 
eyes are sunken, but retain all their wonted spirit ; 
and the expression of countenance is benignant, 
happy, and in the highest degree spiritual. 

" Upon being asked how his toast was at tea, 
' Why not good ? ' he said, but continued with great 
pleasantry, ' The perfect is what we are always to 
seek, and never expect to find.' Speaking of . . . 
he said, ' He is a man of great brilliancy, but is 
never in earnest, and therefore never can accom- 
plish any great work.' ' Biography,' he said, ' is 
for the most part poor. No man should ever under- 



78 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

take to write a biography unless he felt that his 
subject could bear to be presented in an unfavor- 
able light.' He thought we greatly wanted a Life 
of Washington which should show the whole man. 
He thought Washington deficient in the tender 
feelings and sympathies of humanity, or else one 
who had so straightened himself by rules of dignity 
that his natural feelings were kept out of sight, if 
indeed they had any play. He regretted not hav- 
ing spoken upon the subject with La Fayette, who 
was a warm-hearted man, and who seems to have 
found sympathy in Washington." 

Late in life Mr. Morison spoke as follows of 
an incident which may have occurred during this 
period : — 

" I remember, very early in my acquaintance 
with Dr. Channing, going one day to the seashore ; 
and, while the other members of the party were 
scattered apart, we, who were both in feeble health, 
went into a darkened room of the hotel. And 
there he reclined upon the sofa, with his face to- 
ward the little light admitted. The light fell upon 
his face, partially revealing the pale, ample fore- 
head of the man, and the eyes, which seemed not 
fixed on the things of this world, but as if they 
were looking into the world of spiritual thought 
and life. And as he lay there, his countenance 
thus illuminated, he spoke of the passage that he 
had been reading in Philippians, and this passage 
expressed the man, as he was talking, more com- 
pletely than anything else could do. ' For our 






NEW BEDFORD 79 

conversation is in heaven, whence we also look for 
the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.' Pie repeated 
that passage in tones which those who remember 
him may possibly be able to imagine, and talked 
on that double subject, our conversation in heaven 
and the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing 
that I ever heard from him in public, though I was 
the only hearer in the room, ever took me more up 
into the very centre .of God's heavenly kingdom, 
and seemed to shed abroad and around me the 
influence of that holy experience." 

After his stay with Dr. Channing, Mr. Morison 
returned to New Bedford, where he became a mem- 
ber of Mr. Swain's family and the tutor of his son 
Robert. The winters were spent in New Bedford 
and the summers at Naushon. In 1838, by the 
advice of Mr. Morison, Robert Swain was sent to 
Exeter and entered the Academy, but Mr. Mori- 
son continued to make his home with the Swain 
family till his marriage in 1841. Robert Swain 
went from Exeter to Harvard College, where he 
entered as a member of the class of 1845 ; sickness 
prevented his completing his college course, and 
he died in the summer of 1844. A memoir of this 
young man was prepared by Mr. Morison, and sub- 
sequently published, though without the author's 
name. The intimate relationship with the family 
continued as long as any of its members lived. 

In May, 1838, Mr. Morison was ordained as a 



80 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS OX 

minister, and Rev. Ephraim Peabody and lie were 
installed as associate pastors of the First Congre- 
gational Society of Xew Bedford. The ordination 
and installation took place on the 24th day of May, 
the sermon being preached by Rev. Caleb Stetson, 
and the ordaining prayer made by Rev. Francis 
Parkman, D. D.. while the charge was given by 
Rev. Abiel Abbot, of Peterborough. 

The old church in Peterborough had been ori- 
ginally a Presbyterian Church : Londonderry and 
Peterborough, the two Xew Hampshire towns set- 
tled by the Scotch-Irish, long having the only Pres- 
byterian churches in the State. About the end of 
the century the Presbyterian form of government 
had been changed to the Congregational form, but, 
as many in the congregation were attached to the 
Presbyterian mode of worship, it was arranged 
that they should " have the privilege of the meet- 
ing-house one Lord's day in the year for the pur- 
pose of the Administration of the Lord's Supper, 
agreeable to the Presbyterian form of worship." 
This service was performed yearly, generally by 
Rev. William Morison, D. D., of Londonderry, 
commonly known as Priest Morison. "With the 
division of Xew England Congregationalism the 
Peterborough church went with the Liberal side. 1 

1 In lSl'2 a new Presbyterian society was organized, which sub- 
sequently adopted the Congregational form of government. 






NEW BEDFORD 81 

The influences by which Mr. Morison was sur- 
rounded at Exeter and at Cambridge were of 
Liberal character, and he seems to have passed nat- 
urally into the ranks of Unitarian Christians, long 
before he came under the direct influences of Dr. 
Dewey and Dr. Planning. But throughout his 
life Christianity was more to him than the tenets 
of any sect, and there have been few men to whom 
religion and spiritual life were more real. In the 
journal are found these words : — 

" August 8, 1836. Either religion is nothing or 
it is the most important subject that can engage the 
mind : it is either the one thing needful or an en- 
tire delusion of the brain. If it be a dream, why 
do we pay any attention to it ? why not free our- 
selves altogether from its delusions ? But if it be 
the one thing needful, the most important subject 
that can enter the heart, why do we view it with such 
indifference ? Why does it make so light an im- 
pression upon our minds ? Why are our lives — 
our thoughts, words, actions — so little affected by 
it ? He who denies the existence of a God and the 
truth of all religion may be — nay, he is — mad. 
But there is at least method in his madness. His 
insanity is consistent with itself. If he live in 
open and constant disregard of religious rules, his 
conduct is at least of a piece with his principles, 
however insane his principle^ may be. But he who 
acknowledges the divine authority of religious du- 
ties, and yet lives as though no such obligations 



32 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

existed ; he who acknowledges the continual pres- 
ence of a pure and righteous God, and yet hesitates 
not in private to indulge thoughts, cherish wishes 
and perform deeds which he would shudder to have 
made known to his neighbor ; he who acknowledges 
that this life is but the beginning of a never-end- 
ing existence, and yet is as much attached to it, as 
much engrossed in its gains, honors, hopes, vexa- 
tions, as though there were nothing beyond ; he, in 
short, who believes in the commandments of Jesus 
and the perfection of life and character which he 
requires, and yet is satisfied with the low standard 
of morality which the world enjoins, — this man is 
guilty of inconsistencies which, were they not so 
common, would strike us with horror and amaze- 
ment." 

Rev. Ephraim Peabody, with whom Mr. Mori- 
son was settled at New Bedford, was born in Wil- 
ton, a town not far from Peterborough, and was 
one year older than Mr. Morison. He had gradu- 
ated at the Cambridge Divinity School in 1831. 
In 1857, shortly after Mr. Peabody's death, Mr. 
Morison wrote : — 

" A little more than thirty years ago, the writer 
of this article, then a schoolboy at Phillips Exeter 
Academy, was for a few weeks under Mr. Pea- 
body's instruction. During his last college vaca- 
tion, he had taken Dr. Abbot's place for a short 
time. He had then an athletic frame, which, in its 
careless attitudes and motions, seemed as if it con- 



NEW BEDFORD 83 

tained a whole magazine of reserved and silent en- 
ergies. In other respects he had then the same 
qualities for which he was afterwards distinguished, 
— the same mild and equable affections, the same 
enthusiasm for intellectual improvement, the same 
simplicity and modesty which followed him to the 
end of life, the same largeness of nature which, in 
its combination of gentle and noble endowments, 
made it an impossibility for him to do a small ac- 
tion, or to indulge in any other than generous pur- 
poses and feelings. 

" While preaching in Boston, he received a call 
to be settled, with the writer of this article, over 
the First Congregational Church and Society in 
New Bedford. On the 23d of May, 1838, they 
were set apart as associate pastors by the same 
religious services. Both were in feeble health. 
For six years they were there together, most of 
the time in habits of daily and almost hourly inti- 
macy. The survivor dares not trust himself to 
speak of their relation to one another, or to the 
people of their charge. The pastors had no plan 
for their improvement — no professional engage- 
ment, however slight ; no wedding or funeral, or 
more private act of personal intercourse with the 
members of their society ; no studies, hardly indeed 
a thought of any importance — which they did not 
share in common. During those six years, we do 
not think that so much as a momentary misunder- 
standing ever threw its shadow over the pleasant- 
ness of their intercourse ; or that either was ever 



84 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

met with a cold or averted look by any one of 
their people who understood, as few societies could, 
the delicacy of the relation which their pastors 
held to them and to one another. In Mr. Pea- 
body there was a largeness of soul, a quick and 
generous perception of what was due to the feel- 
ings and weaknesses of another, a charity seeking 
not its own, an unpresuming, exacting tenderness 
of affection, and, above all, a truthfulness of act 
and speech, which allowed of no concealment on his 
part, and left no room for suspicion or distrust. 
In a life singularly favored with the friendship of 
wise and good men, his friend must always look up 
with especial thankfulness to Almighty God for 
those years of unreserved, unbroken, and unclouded 
intimacy with him, — an intimacy which afterwards 
underwent no change or diminution. In the last 
interview between the two, he spoke of it in terms 
too sacred to be repeated. The last word that his 
friend heard from his lips was in assent to the 
hope that this friendship, so long and so closely 
continued, was not to end here." 1 

The joint pastorate of these two comparatively 
young men was exceedingly happy to both of them. 
Both of them married Salem ladies. Mrs. Pea- 
body, the mother of the pastor, had moved from 
Wilton to Peterborough, and for many years the 
mother and one sister of each resided in the same 
town. 

The town of Wilton celebrated the centennial of 

1 Christian Examiner, March, 1857. 



NEW BEDFORD 85 

its settlement on September 25, 1839. The cen- 
tennial address on that occasion was delivered by 
Ephraim Peabody. The town of Peterborough 
celebrated the centennial of its settlement on the 
24th of October, 1839. The town first asked 
Judffe Smith to deliver the centennial address, but 
he, at that time nearly eighty years old, declined, 
and the address was delivered by John II. Mori- 
son. Mr. Morison had the Wilton and Peterbor- 
ough addresses bound together in a single volume, 
which he cherished through life. 

In the summer of 1840 Mr. Morison made his 
first trip to the interior of the country, going to 
New York. He left that city on the 10th of May 
for Philadelphia ; went from Philadelphia to Balti- 
more by steamboat ; from Baltimore to Frederick, 
Md., by railroad, and thence by stage across the 
country to Pittsburgh. At Pittsburgh he took 
a steamboat and followed down the Ohio River 
to its junction with the Mississippi, and thence 
went up the Mississippi, reaching St. Louis on 
the 22d of May. He remained in St. Louis 
eleven days, staying with friends who had moved 
there from his native town, but sick nearly all 
the time. His constitution was never one which 
adapted itself quickly to changes of climate. 
From St. Louis he went up the Illinois Eiver by 
steamboat to Utica, and thence crossed by stage to 



86 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

Chicago. At Chicago he took a lake steamer to 
Detroit, and went from there to the home of his sis- 
ter in Medina, Michigan. At Medina he preached 
on Sunday, June 14, for a Baptist minister, and 
thence came to Toledo, where he took a steamer 
for Buffalo, his sister going with him. He spent 
a few days at Niagara and Buffalo ; went by lake 
to Oswego, thence by stage to Utica, visited Tren- 
ton Falls, where, in climbing a cliff, as he always 
thought, he nearly lost his life ; and came by way 
of Albany, Bennington, and Brattleboro to Peter- 
borough, where he arrived on the 27th of June. 
He kept a journal of the trip, but it is of a brief 
character, giving little more than his route, with 
some notes which he apparently intended to write 
up subsequently. A very few thoughts are all 
that it seems wise to reproduce : — 

" West ; climate on physical and mental energy ; 
character of West when present impressions from 
the East shall cease. 

" Slavery : it must disappear. But how ? Can 
evil customs of so long a growth be rooted out at 
once ? and shall they be destroyed by laws which, 
gradually meliorating their severity, shall at length 
wholly destroy them ? 

" Feudal ages : serfs, how affected by the pro- 
gress of society. Slavery : might not laws forbid 
slaves to be sold out of the State ? — husband and 
wife to be separated, young children to be torn 






NEW BEDFORD 87 

from their parents ? — and so go on enlarging the 
rights of the slave till he becomes free, allowing 
time to mellow the fruit of liberty instead of pluck- 
ing it harsh, crude, and unwholesome? What I 
wish is to see something going forward for the 
removal of the worst evil under which our country 
is groaning. 

" Influence of New England, — I have never felt 
it so much as in the West." 

This journey was one of the three occasions in 
which he went beyond the Alleghenies. In the 
summer of 1871 he made a trip for a special pur- 
pose to Western Iowa, and shortly before the fire 
he saw Chicago for the second time. Twelve years 
later, at the request of his oldest son, he visited 
Chicago for the third time, and made a hurried 
trip to the Colorado mountains. 

On the 21st of October, 1841, Mr. Morison was 
married at Salem, Mass., to Miss Emily Hurd 
Eogers, the daughter of Abner Rogers, H. U. 
1800 — who had died before her birth — and Ruth, 
the daughter of Joseph Hurd, of Charlestown, 
Mass. ; she was the step-daughter of Hon. Daniel 
Appleton White, of Salem. After boarding for a 
few months in New Bedford they took a house on 
the southeast corner of Sixth and Walnut streets, 
diagonally opposite the Friends' Meeting-house, 
where on December 19, 1842, their first son was 



88 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

born. In September, 1843, Mr. Morison retired I 
from his active ministry in New Bedford. 

"In September, 1843, I gave up my salary,,! 
and asked leave of absence for an indefinite time. . 
This I did partly because I thought Mr. Peabody's i 
health was then such as to enable him to go on i 
with his work alone, and partly in the hope that 
change of scene and entire freedom from profes- • 
sional care for a year or two might reestablish my 
own health." 1 

We have already seen how Mr. Morison felt to- I 
wards Mr. Peabody. That this feeling was fully 
reciprocated is shown by the following extracts 
from letters from Mr. Peabody to Mr. Morison : — 

" December 18, 1843. ... It is constantly spo- 
ken of, as a matter of course, — without a single 
exception that I have ever heard of, — that you will 
return at the end of the year. Could you hear the 
various expressions of regard and respect which 
are constantly used, it would be, I am sure, some 
compensation for the trials which have for a season i 
taken you away from home. It has operated here 
just as I imagine it generally does when a minis- 
ter who is really respected and loved is compelled I j 
to be absent for a time : it makes him seem nearer 
to a people, — makes them aware of their real feel- 
ings, — and he returns with more weight and influ- 
ence than when he left." 

"February 26, 1844. ... But I cannot but 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 191. 



NEW BEDFORD 89 

hope that by adhering to good rules I shall some 
day see you weigh two hundred, 1 and the possessor 
of a reasonable amount of health." 

" September, 1844. ... I must say one word 
more. It is a small matter, situated as we have 
been, to say that there have been no strifes or 
discords between us. More than this, in looking 
back over a connection of six years, I cannot recall 
one thing on your part which I am not glad to 
remember. It has been from the outset but a 
succession of self-denying kindnesses and friendly 
offices. I know I have made but an imperfect 
return for all this ; but if I have often done what 
was inconsistent with it, what I have done has 
not been the true expression of what I have felt. 
Our connection has been to me one of unmingled 
happiness. Far more than this, and for which I 
desire still more devoutly to thank God, our rela- 
tion has been to me a source of spiritual good. 
However unworthy I am, I feel that my purposes 
and character are better for having known you so 
intimately. There are few changes, in a world of 
changes, which could give me more pain than to 
have this connection broken." 

The actual pastoral relation was not closed until 
late in 1845. During these two years he and his 
family made their home at Salem at Judge White's, 
and while there he prepared and published the life 
of his kinsman, benefactor, and friend, Judge 

1 About 1870 Dr. Morison weighed 228 pounds. 



90 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

Smith. 1 He always looked back on his life in 
New Bedford with peculiar affection. New Bed- 
ford had not yet become a city, but it was at the 
height of its prosperity in the whaling business. 
The people there were well-to-do, generous, and 
open-handed. There he formed friendships with 
men of his own age which lasted through life ; 
though an invalid at the time, he outlived almost 
all these friends. 

Forty years later, an old man, who had been one 
of the young men of his parish, wrote of Mr. Mor- 
ison : — 

" Colleague of Dr. Peabody was the Rev. John 
H. Morison, a divine still living and still engaged 
in valuable religious labors. It would be impos- 
sible to overestimate the importance of the encour- 
agement which a boy of literary aspirations may 
receive from one older in years, and with that 
assured position which gives the right to advise. 
The kindness with which Dr. Morison treated me, 
the timely suggestions which he offered, the gen- 
erosity with which he loaned me books, the ways 
which he found out of intimating to the great com- 
mercial crowd around me that he did not despise 
my juvenile aspirations, I remember now with 
mingled feelings of pleasure and mortification. 

1 Life of the Hon. Jeremiah Smith, LL. D., Member of Congress 
during Washington's Administration, Judge of the United States. 
Circuit Court, Chief Justice of New Hampshire, etc. Boston, 
1845. 












NEW BEDFORD 91 

He is the man whose pardon I should ask, if par- 
don is to be asked of anybody, for my failure to 
have written a real book. . . . How well Dr. Mor- 
ison always asserted the dignity of letters I can 
never forget ; nor how he asked me, a poor, raw 
lad, to lecture at the Lyceum of which he was a 
director. . . . He bore with my foibles, he smiled 
at the impetuosity of youth. All through these 
papers I may be called upon to ask pardon of 
somebody, but the apology which I now make is 
of tenderer issue and comes from my inmost 
heart." x 

Just before his pastorate a handsome granite 
church was built by his society. Fifty years later, 
on the half-century anniversary of the last services 
in the old church, May 20, 1888, he preached 
again in New Bedford, and the words which he 
then uttered are the best illustration of his rela- 
tions there. His text was : " He that findeth his 
life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for 
my sake shall find it " (Matt. x. 39). Only that 
portion of the sermon which was specially con- 
nected with the occasion is here given : — 

" To-day, as you all know, is the fiftieth anniver- 
sary of the last services which your society held 
in their former church. With that old church I 
have very deep and affecting associations, and 
especially with the great preacher who had made 

1 Reminiscences of a Journalist, C. T. Congdon, p. 40. 



92 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

it the centre of moral and religious influences such 
as have seldom entered so vividly into the hearts 
of the young, and gone forth with them to mould 
their characters and enrich their lives. And in 
this connection may I ask of you the privilege of 
saying here, in what was once my home, a few 
words of a more personal character than I have 
anywhere used before in my public ministrations ? 
" The beautiful mountain town in which I was 
born, and where my home now is, has for me at- 
tractions which no other place can have. Exeter 
and Cambridge, with their schools in which I had 
my early intellectual training, and where I formed 
friendships which have always been an inspiration 
and a comfort to me, can never be thought of with- 
out a thrill of grateful affection. But here I found 
still another birthplace. From the college I came 
here, an awkward, diffident, inexperienced youth, 
just entering upon the responsibilities of manhood, 
with keen susceptibilities to the attractions of so- 
ciety and the charms of friendship ; with faculties 
newly awakened, reaching out in every direction 
for truths more uplifting and life-giving than the 
schools had furnished ; and with undefined yearn- 
ings for something, I knew not what, that might 
satisfy the deeper wants of the soul. And here, 
in the cultivated and affectionate homes which so 
hospitably received me, in intimate relationships 
with men and women, young and old, of a some- 
what different type from those whom I had known 
before, there seemed to be opening around me a 
new world. It was as if a new sense had been 



NEW BEDFORD 93 

born within me. My studies became endowed 
with a new meaning. Philosophy, laying open 
new avenues of thought, led me out into regions 
hitherto unexplored. Coleridge, with ideas half 
expressed and thereby indefinitely magnified, was 
to the inexperienced student all the more enchant- 
ing because of the clouds of mysticism by which 
his vaticinations were surrounded. He, more than 
any other at that time, was the apostle of the 
higher German philosophy. Wordsworth particu- 
larly, at that time, was revealing to his votaries 
new openings into the heart of nature ; was leading 
them, as it were, by new approaches into a closer 
union with the soul of the universe. Other poets 
also, old and new, English and German, were gain- 
ing a new ascendency, leading us by unfrequented 
paths into ideal realms, and something of the en- 
chantment attached to those ideal creations seemed 
to attach itself to every-day incidents and events. 
For science had not yet asserted its right to be the 
one supreme ruler over every department of human 
thought and culture. 

" These were among the teachers to whom I was 
greatly indebted when I first came here, fifty-six 
years ago, and took it upon myself to be in some 
small way a teacher of others. But, most of all, I 
was then indebted to that old church, or rather to 
the great preacher there. He spoke to us as one 
weighed down by the burden of the message which 
he was to deliver, — as one intensified in all his 
feelings, and overawed by a sense of the majesty, 
the love, and the all-pervading presence of Him in 



94 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

whose name he spoke. With the exception, per- 
haps, of half a dozen instances of preaching by as 
many different men, Dr. Channing being the great- 
est among them all, I had never then, and to this 
day have never, heard such preaching as I heard 
there from Sunday to Sunday for the greater part 
of a year. It was to me a new revelation of the 
power of sacred eloquence. Very few sermons 
retain their freshness and vitality so long as Dr. 
Dewey's. But, fresh and strong as they were in 
thought and style, he who reads them now can gain 
from them no conception of what they were to us 
who first heard them as they came instinct with the 
life, the glow, the earnest, reverential spirit of him 
whose soul seemed to embody itself in his words. 
I shall never forget what I owe to that great 
preacher and still greater man, so true every- 
where ; so inspired with a sacred dignity and power 
when he rose to speak on great sacred themes ; so 
gentle, affectionate, lowly in heart when we met liim 
in his daily walks ; so buoyant in spirit, like a boy 
let loose from school, in his seasons of recreation ; 
so liberal always, so open to new impressions and 
new conceptions of truth, down to the latest days 
of a life protracted far beyond its fourscore years. 
" These reminiscences belong to my earliest resi- 
dence here, fifty-six years ago. A long period of 
prostrating illness and entire seclusion from study 
and from society ensued. Then, after years of 
slow and imperfect restoration to health, spent 
mostly in this town, it was my privilege fifty years 
ago to be ordained here the associate pastor of this 









NEW BEDFORD 95 



bciety with one of whom I can hardly think with- 
ut the deepest sense of grateful emotion and affec- 
ion. He was one of the truest, wisest, saintliest 
if men ; a man of widely-extended learning ; a man 
f far-reaching, self-forgetting sympathies and af- 
3Ctions, loving and beloved as few men have ever 
een ; a man in whose large and liberal nature no 
oom could be found for so much as a momentary 
iggestion that was not generous and manly ; a 
an very modest in his estimate of himself, if he 
bought of himself at all ; diffident apparently in 
lis intercourse with others, but in an emergency no 
an was more independent or self - reliant, and 
) man braver in troubled times, nor truer to the 
jepest convictions of his nature, than he. Once, 
remember, when we were returning from a suc- 
ssion of parish calls, he said to me, and I heartily 
sented to what he said : ' Among all these homes 
ich we have entered, there is hardly one which 
is not a pleasure and a privilege to visit.' So it 
as here fifty years ago. And the cordial good 
eling which united your ministers extended to all 
le members of their households. A dear child 1 
■: his, beautiful in person and lovely even beyond 
hat is usual at that most attractive age, dying he- 
re she had completed her third year, bore to her 
ave a name which from its associations could not 
.it bind us all still more closely together. 
" With these great qualities, added to extraordi- 
iry personal beauty and personal attractions, our 
iend was trusted, beloved, and honored as few 

1 Emily Morison Peabody. 



96 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

men ever are. In any community he could not fail 
to have a commanding influence, especially with 
the most intelligent and upright members of so- 
ciety. As a preacher he was grave, impressive, 
instructive, with a voice sometimes hard, often mo- 
notonous ; sometimes deep, rich, melodious, filling 
out as with organ-tones passages of sustained moral 
dignity and power ; sometimes, like the sunlight at 
evensong, coloring with richest hues pictures of 
rare poetic beauty, or, most effective of all, flowing 
as a tearful melody through passages of tender, 
melting pathos, such as I have never found in any 
other preacher. 

" For five years we worked here together, the 
labors of the parish pretty equally divided between 
us, — he the principal, I the assistant. It was a 
most happy, affectionate union, no shadow of mis- 
understanding falling on the relationship which 
bound us to each other and to our people. And it 
is a great happiness now to see the same friendship 
drawing our children and children's children affec- 
tionately together. 

" You must excuse these personal remarks. 
When I engaged to preach here this morning, I 
intended to confine myself entirely to the general 
subject suggested by the text. But as I went back 
to those old New Bedford times and experiences I 
found myself carried away by memories and asso- 
ciations which I could not resist. I know very 
well that I am nothing to you, — that the place 
which once knew me knows me no more. Proba- 
bly hardly more than half a dozen of those whom 









NEW BEDFORD 97 

I used to meet in this place have, after the sun- 
shine and storms of fifty years, come here to-day to 
recognize what remains of an old friend. I am 
nothing to New Bedford, but New Bedford is a 
great deal to me. Among the sacred spots in which 
I have tarried or through which I have passed, in a 
life not unblessed by many privileges and friend- 
ships, there is not one which has made a deeper or 
more lasting impression upon me. Here, I may 
say, my mind and heart awoke, as never before, to 
a consciousness of the divine beauty and loveliness 
which may encircle and pervade our human lives, 
and bring them into harmony with one another and 
with the life and the love of God. 

" But my New Bedford is not yours. I do not 
find it as I walk your streets, as I pass by your 
places of business or your homes, or even as I look 
upon you from this once familiar spot. Other 
forms are here present to me, some with thought- 
ful, prophetic souls, patriarchs even then, and look- 
ing serenely forward to the change which was soon 
to pass over them, — fathers and mothers, anxious 
that their children should be better taught than 
they had been ; young men and women, just awak- 
ening to a sense of the momentous realities of life, 
moved, perhaps entranced, by the first mysterious 
stirring of affections reaching upward, and dream- 
ing of a joy too great for this world to fulfill ; 
children, too, — boys, made restless by instincts 
which tell them of the efforts and labors by which 
they are to grow up into men ; young girls, too, 
blossoming into a sphere of maidenly affection, — 



98 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

these, as I knew and loved and prayed for them 
fifty years ago, and as I have treasured them up 
in grateful, thoughtful, reverent remembrance, — 
these are still my friends. Their lives have entered 
into mine. Whether they are yet in the body or 
out of the body is a matter of small concern. They 
are still my friends, alive to me, in a more exalted 
condition it may be, with a more vivid conscious- 
ness of the heavenly influences and agencies by 
which we also are compassed about, still my friends. 
I love to think of them, to go with them as far 
as I may in the unseen realm where they now are, 
to live with them as they live on with me. 

" And is not this the way in which we all should 
live ? When I think of the friends by whose kind- 
ness and love my life has been enriched and blessed 
through all these years, I often feel that, if I have 
done no other good than to call out the kindnesses 
which I have experienced from them, I have not 
lived in vain. May we all lay up treasures of this 
kind, looking back upon the past, not with mourn- 
ful regrets for what is gone, but with thankfulness 
for the richer gifts into which it has ever been trans- 
muted by time, change, and death ; our friends 
losing their lives only to find them transformed 
and glorified, laying down their dying members in 
the dust, and rising from them spiritual and im- 
mortal beings ! As such may we cherish always the 
remembrance of them, from each new experience, 
when it passes away, carrying with us the better 
thought and life to which it has helped us ! 

" So with every friend who passes from this to 



NEW BEDFORD 99 

a more perfect form of being. May we cherish in 
our heart of hearts a new and dearer companion- 
ship as we advance in years, compassed about more 
and more by a cloud of heavenly witnesses ! 

" So may we live in them and they in us, our 
lives more and more hid with them in God ! And 
when this life of faith and hope is resolved into 
sight, and that which is in part is done away, then 
shall the shadows be removed from our eyes and 
we shall know even as we are known." 



MILTON 

In the fall of 1845 Mr. Morison's connection 
with the New Bedford Church, which for two 
years had been of only nominal character, came to 
an end. Shortly afterwards Mr. Peabody also re- 
signed, and became the minister of King's Chapel, 
in Boston. On the 6th of January, 1846, Mr. Mor- 
ison accepted a call to become the minister of the 
First Parish Church in Milton, Mass. The spirit 
in which he went there is shown in his letter of ac- 
ceptance : — 

" To the First Congregational Society in Milton. 

" Brethren, — I have received through your 
clerk a unanimous invitation to settle with you as 
your pastor. That invitation I now accept, not, 
however, without some misgiving lest you should 
be disappointed in one of whom you know so little. 
I shall go among you with the earnest desire to 
perform, as far as my abilities and my imperfect 
health will allow, the solemn duties of a Christian 
minister. It is only through your kindly sympa- 
thy and aid that I can hope for success ; and 



MILTON 101 

may He in whom alone we can trust so strengthen, 
direct, and bless us that the union now to be 
formed may contribute to our happiness and spir- 
itual improvement ! 

" Your friend and brother in the faith, 

"John H. Morison. 

" Salem, January 6, 1846." 

His installation took place January 28, Dr. Gan- 
nett preaching the sermon. For a short time he 
boarded with a Mrs. Sumner, quite near the church, 
in a house afterwards occupied for many years by 
Mr. Charles Breck. He purchased from Mr. John 
M. Forbes — who, though always a resident of Mil- 
ton, had been one of his New Bedford friends — a 
lot of land on Milton Hill, and there built a house, 
which he first occupied in June, 1846. This house, 
to which considerable additions were made at two 
different periods, was his home for thirty-one years. 
The next house was occupied by the family of Rev. 
Henry Ware, Jr., with whom Mr. Morison had 
lived during the short period in which he kept a 
boys' school at Cambridge. His oldest son still 
remembers the hospitable appearance of Mrs. 
Ware at the first meal eaten in the new house. 

It was in Milton that his life's work was done. 
In 1846 Milton was a country town, and Mr. 
Morison always spoke of himself as a country min- 
ister. Two colonial governors had resided there, 



102 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

and from its earliest days a few educated and rich 
people had been among its citizens ; it boasted that 
the first paper-mill in America had been there, 
and that the first railroad (the old Granite Rail- 
way from the Quincy quarries to the Neponset 
River) passed through the town ; but the popula- 
tion was generally a farming population of the 
usual New England type, without the strong in- 
dividual characteristics which the Scotch-Irish 
had given to Mr. Morison's native town in New 
Hampshire. Some old customs and superstitions 
still survived, as Mr. Morison realized when, call- 
ing one day on a recently bereaved family, he was 
told that the oldest daughter had gone to tell the 
bees and put mourning on the hives. Boston was 
at that time a city of about 100,000 people, and 
its suburban influence had hardly reached Milton, 
although that town was but seven miles away. 
The church had been altered and refitted about 
thirteen years before, but the pews were unpainted 
and there was no organ. An instrument called a 
seraphine, with a bass-viol, furnished the accom- 
paniment for the choir. Two services were held 
every Sunday, the afternoon service being at two 
o'clock in winter and half an hour later in the 
summer. From May to November, a Sunday- 
school preceded the morning service. 

The parish soon began to grow, and five years 



MILTON 103 

later, in 1851, the seating capacity of the church 
proving insufficient, alterations were made by 
which the old Sunday-school room was added to 
the body of the church. At this time the walls 
were frescoed and the pews painted ; an organ 
was put in at about the same time. The natural 
beauties of the town made it attractive for the 
summer residence of people whose business de- 
tained them in Boston, and the number of this 
class of families increased rapidly, but during Mr. 
Morison's active ministry the town did not in any 
proper sense become a suburban town. 

The nearness of Milton to Boston placed this 
country parish in many ways among the Boston 
churches, and its minister had the advantage of 
having many professional brethren of the same 
denomination within near distances. This was 
specially important to Mr. Morison, who was still 
in delicate health. During the first year of his 
Milton ministry he did not write a new sermon, 
but adapted old ones to his use. 

With Mr. Morison's settlement in Milton the 
changes and trials which gave so much pathos and 
interest to his early life came to an end. He had ' 
found the position which he was to occupy for the 
rest of his life, and the remaining years were spent 
in a quiet, faithful, modest way, such that those 
who only knew him in his later years had no con- 



104 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

ception of the struggles through which he had 
passed in his early life. 

Two children were born in the house which he 
built in Milton, — his second son, Robert Swain, on 
the 13th of October, 1847, and his daughter Mary, 
April 30, 1851. Both of his sons were in due 
time sent to Phillips Exeter Academy, and gradu- 
ated at Harvard College, the first Morisons of the 
second generation. The older son studied law, 
but abandoned that profession before ever prac- 
ticing, and became a civil engineer. The younger 
son adopted his father's calling. 

In 1861, after the death of her husband, Mrs. 
White, the mother of Mrs. Morison, left Salem 
and became a member of Mr. Morison's family, 
an addition being made to his house for her ac- 
commodation. She was then seventy-seven years 
old, and she continued to reside there till her 
death thirteen years later. The mother and daugh- 
ter had the same birthday, the mother being ex- 
actly thirty years the older. 

Mr. Morison was in 1847 chosen a member of 
the School Committee of the town of Milton, and 
worked on that committee almost continuously for 
twenty years. There was in the town an old acad- 
emy incorporated in 1798, which, with a small 
endowment, had a checkered career. In 1847 Mr. 
Morison was also chosen one of the trustees of this 



MILTON 10 



c 



academy, retaining this position as long as he lived. 
In 1884 the Forbes family, recognizing the impor- 
tance of having a good school in the town, endowed 
and gave new life to the old institution, and, while 
nothing ever shook the great love which Dr. Mori- 
son felt for Exeter Academy, he was glad to see 
the institution of which he was so long the senior 
trustee become a real power in education. 

In April, 1846, Mr. Morison became the editor 
of " The Christian Register," and drove from his 
house to Boston twice a week, though afterwards 
the construction of a branch railroad to Milton 
rendered the drive unnecessary. His editorial life 
covered a long series of years. He retired from 
the sole editorship of " The Christian Register " 
at the end. of June, 1847, but subsequently in con- 
nection with others he was editor from October, 
1849, through the year 1851. From January, 1871, 
through February, 1874, he was sole editor of " The 
Religious Magazine," which afterwards became 
" The Unitarian Review," and from January, 1875, 
through December, 1879, was one of its two editors. 
Besides his direct work as editor, he was an occa- 
sional contributor to various religious periodicals. 

In 1852 he prepared a little book entitled 
" Scenes from the Life of Jesus," which was pub- 
lished by Crosby, Nichols & Company as one of 
a series of Sunday-school manuals. He devoted 



106 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

much time to the preparation of a commentary on 
the Gospels, designed specially for general use. 
The first volume, which covered the Gospel of Mat- 
thew, was completed and published in I860. 1 It 
was the original intention to make this part of a 
commentary of the whole New Testament, of which 
Mr. Morison was to prepare the portion covering 
the Gospels, and Andrew P. Peabody, D. D., the 
remainder. The volume on Matthew, which was 
the result of many years of labor, was the only 
part ever completed. It was Dr. Morison's prin- 
ciple in writing this book, whenever he could 
find his own idea clearly expressed by another, 
to give it as a quotation from that writer ; this 
method gave the appearance of a compilation to 
a book which the author had really worked out 
himself. In the later years of his life his views 
upon critical questions concerning the Gospels were 
somewhat modified ; and, while he never thought 
of re-writing the book, he did think of inserting a 
note in later editions to say that the book took the 
Gospel as we have it, without intending to go into 
the question of the authenticity of its different 
parts. After the publication of this volume he 
devoted his spare time to the study of the Fourth 
Gospel for many years. He found that he could 

1 Disquisitions and Notes on the Gospels: Matthew. Boston, 
1860. 



MILTON 107 

not carry on his studies as he wished without a 
fuller knowledge of the German language, and 
determined to master this language for the prose- 
cution of his work, but other work prevented his 
carrying the study so far as to accomplish his 
purpose. 

In 1858 his Alma Mater, Harvard University, 
conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Divinity. 

In May, 1861, he preached the annual sermon 
before the Massachusetts Convention of Congrega- 
tional Ministers in the Brattle Street Church ; his 
text was Matthew xvi. 25. 

In 1860 he was the annual preacher to the 
Alumni Association of the Divinity School at 
Cambridge. 

The bicentennial of the settlement of the town 
of Milton was celebrated on the 11th of June, 
1862. On the two following Sundays Mr. Morison 
preached sermons suggested by this celebration, 
from which the following extracts are taken : — 

" Our thoughts are naturally carried back to the 
elements of our New England society. First, there 
was the Church. The church which came over to 
Plymouth in the Mayflower was in itself a com- 
plete and independent organization, and a type of 
the rest. According to his words who has said, 
' Wherever two or three are gathered together in 
my name, there am I in the midst of them,' those 



108 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

devout men and women had come together in their 
Master's name, and bound themselves together by 
a religious compact which has served as a type of 
our whole civil polity. After the pattern of the 
church was the town, with its local institutions and 
laws, a separate and almost independent organiza- 
tion, so that, if it should be cut off, as the Plymouth 
colony was for a time, from all other communities i 
and sovereignties, it might have in itself the right 
to execute all the functions of civil government. 
These townships, borrowing their life as they did 
in our early history from the church, are the pecul- 
iar feature of our New England civilization. More 
than three quarters of the money spent and of the 
most important legislation of the country is decided I 
upon in these primary meetings of the people, and 
they alone, self-supporting and self-regulating as 
they are, make a republic like ours possible. 

" But the town organization is made possible 
only by the more vital influences which are at work 
within itself. Of these, the Christian church has 
held the most important place. It has been made 
in no small measure the medium of religious in- 
struction and religious life to each individual soul. 
Its divine spirit enters the school, and makes know- 
ledge a power, not for evil, but for good. It enters 
the home, purifies its affections, softens its asperi- 
ties, consecrates the marriage ties, welcomes the 
little child into its bosom, opens its blessed prom- 
ises to the dying, and lifts up the hearts of the 
sorrowing by its words of immortal faith at the 
very portals of the tomb. 



MILTON 109 

" Say what we may of the stern creed of our 
ancestors, and its hardening' influence on harsh and 
ungainly natures, it was not all harshness. In the 
sentiment of reverence which it fostered, in the 
habit which it encouraged of looking with profound 
and earnest thought into the solemn and awful mys- 
teries of our religion, in the unshrinking courage 
with which it accepted whatever it believed to be 
a divine truth, however severe its exactions, it cul- 
tivated some of the sublimest qualities which be- 
long to the human character. Those ancient men 
who first trod these roads and looked upon these 
hills, or gazed off upon the distant waters, carried 
with them a faith which made the earth the foot- 
I stool of God's throne, and themselves the chosen 
I servants of God to establish here in the wilderness 
i a divinely ordered commonwealth, rich in all the 
promises and fruits of holy living. 

• •••••••• 

" There is no picture of the past so attractive 
to me as that of a Christian home. In carrying 
I our thoughts back to the early settlers at times 
i when every nerve was strained to meet the phys- 
. ical wants of the day, we see that there was always 
' found a season, not only in the church for public 
' worship, but at home for prayer and religious in- 
! struction, and the cultivation of those inward 
graces which draw together the members of a 
i household by something stronger than the ties of 
! interest or habit, and throw over the opening in- 
telligence of the child visions more sacred and in- 
spiring than the earth can give. In those visions 



110 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

of heavenly glory, those thoughts of near access 
and solemn accountability to God, the child's 
whole nature was bathed and made alive. They 
touched the inmost springs and motives of conduct, 
and moulded his views and habits of life. While 
the characters thus fashioned were to some extent 
marked by the severity which grew out of the the- 
ology of the age and the hardships to which the 
men were exposed, they were also filled with the 
tender sympathies and affections which are always 
cherished by a heartfelt intercourse with God, and 
which cannot be separated from the religious nur- 
ture of a Christian home. 

" In each of these homes the presiding genius 
and divinity of the place was the Christian mother. 
She was the centre of kindly influences and attrac- 
tions. Out-of-door cares and toils tasked to the 
utmost the time and strength of the father. But 
she, not less heavily burdened with bodily labor, — 
even in her sorrows perhaps finding no leisure for 
grief, but working, and weeping while she worked, 
— was always there, the dignity of her outward 
demeanor subdued by the solicitudes and yearn- 
ings which drew her towards her children. Amid 
the hardships which might have been caused by 
the severity of their creed, or the stern necessities 
which pressed upon them and hemmed them in, 
here was a never-failing fountain opening within 
their homes, and supplying them with the soft, 
sweet waters of domestic peace. The birth of a 
child was a new evangel, calling into exercise all 
the tenderness and strength of a mother's heart. 



MILTON 111 

Her self-denying virtues, her conjugal affections, 
her intelligence, her faith, in itself the evidence of 
things not seen, and the deeper religion of the 
heart, were all employed in her domestic relations. 
' When my mother comes from her chamber where 
she has been praying,' said a young man of rare 
intellectual gifts, 1 ' her face is like the face of an 
angel.' So has many a mother been glorified in 
the eyes of her children. 

"And such were the mothers whom we love to 
look back upon as the pride and glory of the days 
that are gone. They, under God, formed the great 
men who, by their far-seeing wisdom, their strong 
wills, and sublime faith, were always equal to the 
emergencies of their time, who elevated the tone 
of public morals, enlarged the intelligence and 
strengthened the virtues of the age in which they 
lived, and thus laid, here on this North American 
contineut, the foundations of a mighty empire, so 
deep and firm that neither the passions of wicked 
men nor the gates of hell shall prevail against it. 

" It is the merciful infusion of domestic love 
and kindness that saves men from becoming a race 
of infidels and savages. Man gladly accepts the 
aid of a nature more delicate than his own, more 
open to religious impressions and to the finer in- 
fluences that are around us. While he seems to 
be the controlling mind, he willingly subjects him- 
self to her finer instincts. In recognizing the ori- 
ginal differences of organization between the sexes, 
he joyfully acknowledges her superiority in some 

1 Ralph Waldo Emerson. 






112 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

things, as he practically asserts his own superiority 
in others. By adjusting itself to constitutional di- 
versities and seeking harmony in variety, gaining 
mutual support by mutual submission and respect, 
society here in New England has done much, 
though much remains to be done, to make the 
position of woman honorable, and her influence 
what it should be. Relations thus mutually help- 
ful, affections kept alive by acts of kindness every 
day reciprocated, cannot be otherwise than blessed. 
The longer they continue the more alive they are. 
And when, after a long union, the connection seems 
to be dissolved by death, then all the more touch- 
ing is the pathos of the separation, and the stronger 
the assurance which the heart finds of a reunion. 
An aged woman whom I knew, gazing tearfully 
on the face of her husband who had just ceased to 
breathe at the age of eighty-five or eighty-seven 
years, exclaimed : ' O Billy, Billy ! shall I never 
hear your voice again ? We have lived together 
more than fifty years, and I never heard from you 
an unkind word.' I was with a man eighty-four 
years old, who supposed himself to be, as he was, 
almost on the borders of eternity. ' I would gladly 
die,' he said, ' if I could only be sure of meeting 
my wife ' — who had died some years before — ' and 
knowing her again.' These are the feelings fos- 
tered by long lives of mutual fidelity and kindness 
in the dearest domestic relations. They give the 
assurance of peace and happiness on earth, and I 
reach on in hope and love to that world where ties I 
apparently broken here shall be united again." 






MILTON 113 

In 1867 Rev. George H. Hepworth organized a 
Divinity School in Boston, with an idea of training 
young men of moderate means and education to 
enter the Unitarian ministry, expecting to supply 
a class of ministers somewhat like many Methodist 
preachers. This school had a short life, ending in 
the year 18G9. In this school Dr. Morison took 
the position of Professor in the Exegesis and 
Literature of the New Testament. A gentleman 
well qualified to judge, from his intimate connec- 
tion with the school, writes of his work : — 

" His own Book of Commentaries was in use, 
and his services to the school most valuable. His 
talk with the young men discussed not only his 
particular subject of instruction, but covered the 
whole field of ministerial duty and work in a prac- 
tical way that was especially helpful. No one con- 
nected with the school was more highly appreciated 
or more beloved." 

He entered earnestly into the discussion between 
the two wings of the Unitarian denomination in 
regard to the preamble of the Constitution of the 
National Conference of Unitarian and other Chris- 
tian Churches. It was a subject concerning which 
he felt deeply, and he prepared an article on it 
which he published under the title of " Christian 
Liberty " in " The Religious Magazine " for May, 
1870, and from which the following paragraphs 
are taken : — 



114 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" Wherever two or more persons form a partner- 
ship, there must be to some extent a surrender of 
individual preferences. As far as relates to the 
concerns of the partnership, there cannot be with 
either of the parties the same liberty of action that 
he had before. The conditions to which each one 
submits are usually stated in the articles of agree- 
ment. . . . Most of the moral and religious enter- 
prises of our day are carried on by means of vol- 
untary associations. The Christian church and 
congregation belong to agencies of this class, and 
are distinguished from others only by their origin, 
the long succession of ministrations through which 
they have come down to us, and the vital influences 
which they have had and still have on the greatest 
concerns which can address themselves to a human 
being. 

" Here is one essential fact which is to be borne 
in mind. Another fact, equally essential in order 
to a just consideration of the subject, must also be 
borne in mind. The most important concerns in 
the life of every man are those which affect himself 
personally. The most sacred rights are the rights 
of the individual. The most effective offices of 
religion are those which belong to the individual 
soul in its secret relations with God. 

• •••••••• 

" There is a sacredness in the individuality which 
God has thrown around every human soul. Every 
man has a right to freedom from intrusion within 
the hallowed seclusion of his own thoughts. He 



MILTON 115 

who made us does not forcibly obtrude himself 
upon us there, even to oblige us to do what is right. 
We cannot lay bare the secret organs of life in a 
plant, and intrude ourselves on the mysterious oper- 
ations which are going on there, without marring 
the perfect work which God is carrying out by his 
own secret processes. Even the delicate tissues of 
a plant shrink with an instinctive shudder from 
such an exposure and desecration. Far less can 
we, without serious harm, interfere by the intrusion 
of foreign agencies on what is most vital and essen- 
tial in the spiritual life and growth of a human 
being. 

" In the faith of Jesus, and in the grander lib- 
erty of those who believe in him, we endeavor to 
live. Our churches are Christian churches. Most 
of them accept the New Testament as the only rule 
of faith and practice. But we do not say that 
every word in our English version is the inspired 
word of God. We leave it to those who are most 
competent as scholars to determine for us precisely 
what reading is to be preferred. We adopt no 
particular theory of inspiration or of interpreta- 
tion. We study into these things ; we write and 
preach upon them ; we write and preach on what 
we regard as the great theological doctrines of our 
religion. But we do not frame our opinions into 
articles of faith or conditions of Christian fellow- 
ship. 

" Can we go farther than this without going 
plainly and palpably beyond the religion of Jesus ? 



116 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 






As a Christian church, can we ask for a larger 
liberty? Giving up the New Testament as truth- 
ful statements of facts, giving up Jesus as the head 
of the church, we may enter into a wider range of 
inquiry, we may accept doctrines beyond what he 
taught, we may be seekers after truth ; but are we 
seekers after Christian truth ? Is the liberty to 
reject Christ and his teachings a Christian liberty ? 
We do not condemn those who look on the Gospels 
as they do on other writings, and view Christ as 
they do other teachers, and, leaving them behind, 
go on in search of some grander dispensation. 
They may be conscientious and good men. We 
do not judge them ; neither can we allow them to 
judge us, or to carry us away from our inheritance 
as believers in Christ. Living in the free atmos- 
phere of the Gospels, recognizing Christ as the 
head of the church which he came into the world 
to establish, feeling in it the beauty and the power 
of that grand communion of Christian souls who 
lived in him, and of Christian sentiments which 
are breathed out from him in all his words and 
acts, we should be false to our holiest convictions 
if we should give up his name. To speak of a 
church without Christ would be for us an utter per- 
version of language. To leave out the name of 
Christ, in order to satisfy the scruples of another 
and allow him to join with us, would be to sacrifice 
both means and end. We must be honest. Can 
he be called a Mohammedan who rejects the teach- 
ings of Mohammed? or he be called a Christian 
who rejects the teachings of Christ ? 



MILTON 117 

" If there are those who think they have found, 
or who expect to find, a truer faith, a grander and 
more uplifting system of morals, of course they do 
not accept the teachings of Jesus, nor desire to be 
called by his name. But while we hold our minds 
open to all truth, and gladly welcome it from what- 
ever quarter it may come, — from philosophers and 
sages who lived thousands of years ago, or from 
devout and inspired seekers after truth who have 
lived in our own time, or who now live, — we have 
found nothing yet, and we expect to find nothing, 
which will carry us so far as he does into the depths 
of divine truth and of the infinite love. We be- 
lieve that in ages yet to come, as in ages past, the 
spiritual life which is to redeem and purify the 
world must come from him. In other associations 
we may consent to live under a constitution which 
leaves out all mention of his name ; but, in the 
church instituted by him, Christian truth is our 
daily bread. Christian life is that which we seek 
to live ourselves and to awaken in others ; and 
Christ himself is, under God, the great central 
teacher and inspirer. To give him up, and with 
him the ideas, sentiments, emotions, affections 
which gather round his name and bind us together 
in fellowship with him and with one another, is not 
to give up a form, but the substance and life of our 
religion. 

" This faith in Christ and the Gospels, making 
him the chief corner-stone in our belief, has been 
always a distinguishing feature with those who 
have belonged to our communion. Historical Chris- 



118 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 






tianity has nowhere found abler defenders, from 
the days of Grotius and Lardner down to the time 
of Channing and Norton, than in our body. 

" But, side by side with this earnest assurance 
and assertion of the truthfulness of the Christian 
records, there has been always, from the time of 
John Milton, a love of liberty rebelling against all 
attempts to restrain freedom of thought, even when 
employed on the most sacred of all themes. While 
we cannot consent to expunge from our church 
covenants the name and the authority of Christ, 
we respect the conscientious convictions of others, 
and shrink from imposing Christian views upon 
them as conditions of Christian fellowship. We 
may seek to answer the question, What is Chris- 
tianity ? What are the divine truths which we 
claim that it has given to the world ? What is the 
exact nature and rank of that great being towards 
whom the holiest and greatest of men have turned 
with thankful and loving reverence, and who is 
still, more than all other teachers, the great illu- 
minating and quickening power among men, — the 
hope, the joy, the refuge of those who have no 
other hope or refuge left ? These are questions of 
momentous importance. But they are not vital 
questions ; they relate only to the interpretation 
which men may put on the language of Jesus, or 
the explorations which we may make into subjects 
that lie perhaps beyond us. While we give our 
explanations of these things, we would leave every 
one free to accept or reject our conclusions. 

" We do not insist upon particular views of Chris- 



MILTON 119 

tianity as essential to the Christian name. Our 
denominationalism consists very much in our free- 
dom from all denominational peculiarities. Most 
of us are Unitarians, but we do not insist on a be- 
lief in Unitarianism as a test of Christian fellow- 
ship. We fall back on the Gospels as truthful 
narratives of fact, and on the great central person- 
age whom they reveal to us. If the fathers, who 
established two centuries ago the church of which 
the writer of this article is the pastor, should re- 
turn to it to-day with their Calvinistic views un- 
changed, they would find nothing in its articles of 
faith to prevent their entering into it, and carrying 
it on, without altering one word of its covenant, or 
giving up one article of their faith. As a Chris- 
tian church and society we hold ourselves respon- 
sible to God, and have no doctrinal tests which can 
exclude any one who claims to be a Christian dis- 
ciple, and who as a Christian asks to be received 
among us. 

" Our Christian views we cherish as the precious 
fruits which have grown in this atmosphere of 
free and liberal thought. If we should endeavor 
to perpetuate our views by narrowing for others 
the freedom which we have ourselves enjoyed, we 
should destroy the very conditions by which our 
Christian views and characters have been formed. 

• •••••••• 

" Beyond the fact of declaring it to be a Chris- 
tian institution, we are careful to do nothing to 
exclude from the church any one of correct life 



120 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

and habits who modestly and reverently asks to be 
admitted. On the other hand, we are careful to do 
nothing to ' compel men to come in ' when they are 
not drawn by the promptings of the spirit within 
them. We do not seek to create a crisis or exigency 
which, by an artificial pressure, may interfere with 
their deliberate convictions, and, in the contagious 
enthusiasm or excitement of the season, bring in 
those who are not prepared to enjoy or profit by its 
ordinances. It is possible that we may have car- 
ried this principle of non-interference too far. We 
present the subject, state the grounds of our con- 
victions, converse with those who are willing to 
hear, and invite all who will to join us ; but we do 
not lay upon it the stress and emphasis which are 
given to it by those who believe that partaking of 
the Lord's Supper is essential to salvation. 

" In seeking this more perfect liberty, we are fol- 
lowing our own convictions, and we are conforming 
to the traditions which have come down to us from 
the honored men of a former generation. We are 
only obeying what may be regarded as the common 
law of the Christian communion to which we be- 
long. Liberal Christianity was cherished by many 
of our greatest men fifty years ago, not as an em- 
bodiment of peculiar doctrines, but as the rule and 
substance of Christian liberty, as a moral force dif- 
fusing itself everywhere ; a spiritual leaven, finding 
its way into the purest and best minds everywhere, 
especially among the young, welcoming them to 
wider fields and more vital methods of investiga- 



MILTON 121 

tion, awaking freer thoughts, emancipating them 
from unreasonable and arbitrary canons of Bibli- 
cal interpretation, calling them into a grander lib- 
erty, loosening everywhere by insensible degrees 
the chains which the narrow dogmatism of our 
New England church had been throwing over reli- 
gious inquiries by binding all searchers after truth 
to arrive at certain predetermined conclusions. 
This cry of liberty was hailed as the omen and 
watchword of a great movement by thousands of 
thinking minds outside of our own communion. 
Even those who dreaded and opposed it caught 
something of its spirit, on account of their enthu- 
siastic love of liberty and their faith in free in- 
quiry. 

" In establishing a National Conference to awaken 
a new interest, and to furnish new facilities for 
the advancement of Christian truth and life, by 
a single clause it was baptized into the name of 
Christ, and thus recognized and set apart by those 
who founded it as a Christian organization. The 
preamble is as follows : ' Whereas the great op- 
portunities and demands for Christian labor and 
consecration at this time increase our sense of the 
obligations of all disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ 
to prove their faith by self-denial, and by the devo- 
tion of their lives and possessions to the service of 
God and the building up of the kingdom of his 
Son.' 

" Here was an expression in accordance with the 
covenants in our churches. But, before the consti- 



122 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

tution was adopted, the other characteristic of our 
denomination, its extreme sensitiveness on the mat- 
ter of religious freedom, had shown itself in a 
preliminary resolution offered by the business com- 
mittee that all resolutions and declarations of the 
Convention should only be regarded as expressing 
the opinions of the majority, ' claiming no other 
than a moral authority over the members.' At a 
subsequent meeting, this clause, with some altera- 
tion, was adopted by the Conference as the ninth 
article of its constitution, affirming 'that all the 
declarations of this Conference, including the pre- 
amble and constitution, are expressions only of its 
majority, committing in no degree those who object 
to them,' etc. 

" This ninth article, strictly construed and ap- 
plied,, undoubtedly nullifies all the rest. The de- 
clarations in the constitution that the ' officers 
shall consist of a president,' etc., that the ' consti- 
tution may be amended ... by a vote of not less 
than two thirds,' ' commit in no degree those who 
object to them.' We doubt if there is another 
association in the land, formed for practical pur- 
poses, whose fundamental laws so cancel and de- 
stroy one another. The declaration in the preamble 
was an honest declaration, to which no one claim- 
ing to be a Christian could object. But, lest some 
one should be offended by the name of ' the Lord 
Jesus Christ,' this last explanatory, or rather nul- 
lifying, clause was added. We love and honor the 
men who proposed it ; but, were it not for the 
gravity both of the subject and of the occasion, we 






MILTON 123 

could hardly view their action in a serious light. 
The most obvious parallel is to be found in the 
4 Midsummer Night's Dream,' where he who is to 
enact the part of a lion, through dread of terrifying 
the audience is to tell them plainly in the midst of 
his performance that he is no lion, but only ' Snug 
the joiner.' 

" But, in all seriousness, what shall we say ? 
Lord Macaulay, in the tenth chapter of his His- 
tory, speaking of the resolution of Parliament 
which declared the throne vacant, in a preamble 
containing two opposite and inconsistent reasons, 
says : ' Logic admits of no compromise. The 
essence of politics is compromise. It is therefore 
not strange that some of the most important and 
most useful political instruments in the world 
should be among the most illogical compositions 
that ever were penned. ... In fact, the one beauty 
of the resolution is its inconsistency. . . . To the 
real statesman, the single important clause was that 
which declared the throne vacant ; and, if that 
clause could be carried, he cared little by what pre- 
amble it might be introduced.' These words, in 
the general idea which they convey, seem to have 
been written for the case before us, and we accept 
them as suggesting the best excuse that can be 
given. 

" We believe that some of the most modest, ear- 
nest, and conscientious of our young preachers are 
sometimes deterred from believing in Christ, not 



124 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

from a want of evidence, but from a morbid fear 
that they may come to such convictions because it 
is for their interest to do so. Like a man standing 
on a plank a hundred feet from the ground, they 
feel such a dread of losing their belief that they 
become confused and fall. We call to mind a 
young minister who entered on his work and 
preached with remarkable success, but who began 
to doubt whether he had the faith which a Chris- 
tian minister ought to have, and under that impulse 
gave up his parish and engaged in the studies of 
another profession. We know nothing of his secret 
or personal history. But it may be that the dread 
of not believing may have created the ghostly appa- 
ritions and doubts which he feared. And now that 
this constraint is taken away, may not his mind act 
more freely in that direction, and be able to hold 
with a firmer grasp the reasons by which he should 
be guided, and see with a clearer vision the truths 
which once seemed clouded and unreal? More 
than one able and conscientious minister we have 
known who has gone through this experience, and 
who has come back from other occupations to 
the profession of his early love with new strength 
of conviction, with new zeal and enthusiasm, and 
with a gentleness, a modesty, a calm maturity 
of wisdom, which have added greatly to his influ- 
ence. 

" Towards these and such as these, through the 
dark and trying days when they long for sympathy 
and kindness, and are in the greatest need of intel- 
lectual support and guidance, shall we turn a for- 



MILTON 125 

bidding look, and close our Eden against them by 
' a flaming sword turned every way ' to keep them 
from the ' tree of life ' ? Of course we woidd not. 
No one among us would knowingly do such a thing 
as that. It would be inhuman as well as unchris- 
tian. But it becomes us to consider whether adopt- 
ing more stringent rules of faith and discipline, at 
this time, would not be a step — and a pretty im- 
portant step, too — in this direction. How is it 
with our young men, those who, in their matured 
experience and the fullness of their powers, are to 
be our most accomplished and efficient ministers ? 
Except in very rare instances, they do not grow up 
faultless angels all the way from the cradle to the 
pulpit. In all denominations, many of the most 
beloved and honored ministers have gone through 
a strange preparatory discipline. St. Augustine, — 
let any one read his ' Confessions ' who would 
learn a lesson of toleration towards young students 
of theology ; John Newton, the master of a slave- 
ship ; John Bunyan, from his own account a blas- 
phemer and infidel, fighting with Satan, and 
1 often getting worsted in the contest ; Henry Ward 
Beecher, an atheist, or thinking himself so, though 
at that very time, and because of his unbelief, his 
father, with his large faith and his keenness of 
insight into the workings of the human soul, saw 
the tokens and promise of a minister of Christ. 
Even our Channing, who seems to us to have been 
always such an example of saintly purity and faith, 
has told us, with strong emotion, of a period in his 
life when, in consequence of the doctrines in which 



126 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

he had been educated, it would have been an un- 
speakable relief to him to know that there was no 
God, and that death was an everlasting sleep. The 
immature experiments of young men, both in faith 
and practice, their wild and inconsistent ideas and 
actions, are to be regarded very tenderly. We 
remember how dangerous it used to be to confine 
too closely in the autumn the colts which had been 
running at large on the mountains all the summer, 
lest they should be crippled for life. There must 
be freedom for young men, in order to secure the 
finest elements of character. 



" We have sought, with much anxiety, to recon- 
cile the claims of liberty and truth, without doing 
violence to either, so as to determine, as far as we 
may, where our duty lies. We have sought to 
promote the cause of Christian faith without inter- 
fering with the freedom of thought which belongs 
as a right to every one who is really engaged in 
the search after truth. We have endeavored to 
put aside all personal feeling, and to abide by what 
we believe to be most in harmony with the spirit 
of Christ, which is the spirit of truth, and there- 
fore best fitted to extend this kingdom in the world. 
In the words of one of the wisest as well as wittiest 
of the old English divines, ' no discreet person will 
conclude our faith the worse because our charitv is 
the more ; ' and, on the other hand, we trust that 
no man will account our charity the worse because 
our reverence for truth is even more than our love 
of liberty. In the grand field of Christian thought 



■ 



MILTON 127 

and enterprise, both move on in loving fellowship. 
It is by the free exercise of our minds under the 
inspiration of the Almighty that we are led into 
all truth. And it is the truth that makes us free. 
Liberty is enlarged and strengthened by the helps 
which it draws from our Christian faith, and is 
never crowned with so divine a dignity as when, 
kneeling reverently before the cross of Christ, it 
goes forth in his name to loose every bond, and 
reveal itself in all its beauty to a longing world, 
as the glorious liberty of the sons of God, even 
the liberty with which Christ shall make us free." 

But through this whole period his principal work 
was in his own parish. He was a very faithful 
parish minister, and was never kept away from his 
' people by the most virulent contagious disease. 
He never allowed any personal engagement, how- 
ever important, to stand in the way of his ministe- 
rial duties. His sympathy and. power of consola- 
tion made him welcome not only in his own parish 
but in neighboring towns, where he was often 
called to attend funerals of people whom he knew 
but slightly. 

He was still delicate, and unable to do the work 
of a strong man. Occasionally he would be absent 
from Milton for a few weeks at a time, but the 
limits of his journey never exceeded visits to his 
brothers in Baltimore, trips to the White Moun- 
tains, and in later years to Mount Desert. He 



128 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

always continued to make frequent visits to his 
native town. 

He was always fond of the best English writers, 
and especially of the poets. For more than ten i 
years he usually had a weekly class of ladies, who i 
met in his study, and were stimulated by his im- - 
pressive reading of the great poets. In this class i 
he read not only English writers from Chaucer to > 
Tennyson, but extended his work to the Greek 
poets and to Dante. 

In 1867 his brother James, after a ten years' 
residence in California, returned to New England, 
and in the following year settled as a physician 
in the neighboring town of Quincy. From this 
time on, the two brothers met several times a 
week. 

Dr. Morison always remembered the help which 
he had received as a boy from the free library iu 
Peterborough. When the question of establishing 
a public library at Milton came up, he supported it 
with enthusiasm. One of the most earnest speeches 
he was ever heard to make at a public meeting 
was made in the Milton Town Hall on this sub- 
ject. It turned the sentiment of the meeting in 
favor of the library. The library was established 
in 1870, and he was one of the first Board of Trus- 
tees. He devoted a great deal of time to the selec- 
tion of the books with which it was originally 



MILTON 129 

equipped. He was reelected a Trustee so long as 
he was a citizen of Milton. 

Mr. Morison became bald as a young man ; his 
hair was almost white before he was fifty. When 
he first came to Milton he wore side whiskers, but 
shaved his chin. He subsequently allowed his full 
beard to grow, shaving only the upper lip. Before 
passing middle life he had acquired the dignified, 
patriarchal look which he kept till the end. When 
he was but fifty-three years old, the " Peterborough 
Transcript " contained the following : — 

" Rev. John H. Morison, of Milton, Mass., a 
native of this town, preached to a very full house 
at the Unitarian Church last Sabbath. His hoary 
locks speak warningly of the advance of time, yet 
his vigorous step and keen intellect show that he 
understands ' how not to grow old.' 

After the close of the war his health improved, 
and he took more satisfaction in his work than he 
had ever done before, but the example of Judge 
Smith was always in his mind, and he used to say 
that he did not intend to preach after he was sixty. 
He extended this time, however, and continued 
sole pastor of the Milton church for twenty-five 
years, when he was nearly sixty-three. At the end 
of this period, on the last Sunday before the ordi- 
nation of a colleague, he preached a sermon enti- 



130 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

tied, " The Beauty of Change," which is appropri- 
ately given here : — 

But we shall all be changed. — 1 Cor. xv. 51. 

He hath made everything beautiful in his time. — Eccl. iii. 11. 

" Change is written on every earthly thing as a 
part of the law of God. But, being ordained by 
him, and interwoven into the constitution of the 
universe, it cannot of itself be an evil. He hath 
made everything beautiful in his time. The evo- 
lution from a lower to a higher condition, from a 
lower to a higher order of being, must of necessity 
be a change. But it is nevertheless a great gain. 
There is usually something painful in the pro- 
cesses by which its ends are accomplished ; and 
even when our gains are the greatest it is not with- 
out some uneasy sensations that we look forward 
to it, nor without some sharp feelings of regret that 
we look back on the altered circumstances amid 
which we lived before the change took place. No- 
thing could induce us to go back into the old life 
and live it over again. Yet, as it comes up to us 
through our affections, we see how beautiful it was 
in its time, and how much of what is dearest to us 
now had its seed-time there. With a certain tender 
regret and almost longing, we think of the home, 
the incidents, the friends which once performed 
so important an office for us, but winch, so far as 
this world is concerned, can have no place with us 
except in our silent memories and affections. How 
beautiful are they to us as we see them lying away 
back there in the distant horizon and twilight of 



MILTON 131 

our childhood ! How much, through our memo- 
ries and our affections, are they still doing- to make 
our lives beautiful and sacred ! How much would 
our present lot be impoverished, how much of its 
richest joy and satisfaction would be taken out of 
it, if there were in the past no spots thus sacred to 
our hearts, — no holy land where dear ones, now in 
heaven, once lived with us, teaching us how to live, 
and then, changed from mortal to immortal by 
their rising into higher realms, revealed to us the 
possibility and the reality of something better than 
the eye can see ! 

" We shall all be changed. Whatever lives on 
earth changes. Life itself is but a process of 
change, and the more intense it is, the more rapid 
is the change. No morning sun looks on the same 
world that it lighted up the day before. No friend 
who has been absent from us a week finds us pre- 
cisely as he left us. Manners and men, institutions 
and those who live under them, the outward universe 
and the mind of man, never continue in one stay. 
, There is no permanent abiding-place for us, and, 
, if there were, we could not remain in it. The 
. times are always changing, and we, unconsciously 
to ourselves, are changing with them. When we 
I eat, we take in new supplies of fuel to feed the 
. secret fires which are consuming the old, and sub- 
■ stituting for it a new organization through every 
part of our bodies. By this double process of de- 
' struction and creation, we live from moment to 
moment. Like the bush seen by Moses at Moimt 
i Horeb, which burned with fire and yet was not 



132 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

consumed, we are always on fire ; and it is of the 
Lord's mercies, through his wonderful adaptation 
of means to ends, that we are not consumed. We 
are changing always while we live, and when we 
die ' we shall all be changed in a moment, in the 
twinkling of an eye.' And as in life every change 
has its beneficent purpose and is beautiful in its 
time, each season fulfilling its purpose for us and 
helping us on with riper faculties to the new oppor- 
tunities which await us, so the last great change 
that men recognize on earth hath God made, more 
than all the rest, beautiful in his time, if only we 
turn to their fitting use the opportunities and priv- 
ileges which are granted to us. 

" Every day is working its silent changes in our 
bodies and our minds. Every day is bringing 
something to us, and carrying something away. 
There can be no successful resistance to that law, 
and we cannot evade it. But it is a merciful provi- 
sion. It is a benignant part of the great benignant 
plan of Him who doeth all things well, and who 
hath made everything beautiful in its time. 

" There are two things on which our highest suc- 
cess in life must depend. One, and indeed the 
great thing, is to use our opportunities while we 
have them. The next thing is to give them up 
gracefully and cheerfully when their time is ended. 
Instead of mourning over what is going from us, 
we should turn ourselves to the new opportunities 
which take its place, and get from them all that we 
can. The change is not necessarily a sad one. It 
may be just the allotment which is best fitted to 



MILTON 133 

carry us on, to teach us new lessons, to open before 
us new fields of usefulness and enjoyment, to exer- 
cise new faculties, to strengthen our faith, to deepen 
our experience of God's love, to refine and subdue 
our hearts, and bring us into more perfect sym- 
pathy with the Divine Will. 

" A change has come. We must give up, per- 
haps, a cherished occupation. It has been very 
dear to us. Our life has been bound up in it. 
We found it a privilege, a comfort, a joy to us, 
and we had hoped so to use it as to make it also a 
comfort and a joy to others. But our time for it 
is past. What then? Is everything gone from 
: us ? By no means. This withdrawal of one privi- 
lege may be only an opening into another and 
richer field. There may be a momentary pang as 
we turn away from beloved walks, and look forward 
into new scenes and labors. But we accept the 
new attitude of things. We adjust our thoughts 
and our conduct to it. We find new food for our 
minds, new interests for our hearts to expand in, 
new sources of usefulness and happiness. And 
then we begin to see how beneficent the plan is 
that reaches through all things, and makes each 
separate incident, each separate moment, an instru- 
ment connected with all the rest, for the orderly 
and harmonious advancement of whatever should 
be most precious to us. 

" I remember being very indignant, many years 
ago, when, by some political management, Nathan- 
iel Hawthorne was turned out of a small govern- 
ment office by which he had been able to earn a 



134 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

scanty support for his family. ' What,' we asked, 
' will become of this poor man now ? What is to 
save him and them from severe want? What is 
there that he can do ? ' So we asked, and could 
give no hopeful answer to our question. But God, 
who had endowed that man with such a wonderful 
gift of genius, had something better for him to do 
than could be found in a subordinate department 
of the Salem Custom House. He therefore drove 
him out from that place, which could only cramp 
and impoverish his soul. And, being driven out 
from it, he was thrown back upon himself, and in 
the marvelous creations of his imagination he found 
other ways of earning his bread, while at the same 
time he furnished other and better supplies to hun- 
dreds of thousands who had learned that man can- 
not live by bread alone. Had it not been for the 
fearful disappointment to which he was subjected, 
he might never have known what capabilities there 
were bound up within him, and the world would 
never have known the loss which it sustained. 

" Here is an illustration which may apply in 
some degree to every one of us. We have not his 
intellectual powers. But we all of us have moral 
and spiritual faculties capable of an expansion be- 
yond all that even his imagination could conceive 
of. And often it is only by being forced away 
from one after another of our chosen haunts where 
we are quietly earning our bread that we are en- 
abled to come to ourselves, and to find the infinite 
resources of Christian faith and love with which 
God has endowed us, and which He is waiting by 



MILTON 135 

these new and better methods to unfold within us, 
that so they may be made a blessing to ourselves 
and to all around us. How many a self-denying 
act has thus been awakened into being ! How 
many a homely virtue has thus been cherished in 
the heart till it came forth to shine with a celestial 
purity and radiance ! How many thoughts, warmed 
and illuminated by a heavenly spirit, have thus been 
called from within us, and made to shed their joy 
and hope in our daily paths ! How many souls 
have thus been born into a loftier experience, so as 
to throw a diviner light around them in their pas- 
sage through the world ! 

" The order of nature and the order of Provi- 
dence unite in carrying us on through this univer- 
sal process of change. We cannot withstand or 
retard its motion. If we seek to interfere with it, 
we shall be thrust rudely away, or ground to pow- 
der. But if we adjust ourselves to it, yielding will- 
ingly where we must yield, seeking to make each 
incident or event do its fitting part, then there can 
be no failure. Whether we succeed or not in our 
present work, all is well with us. The blessings 
and mercies of Heaven fall upon us. Each moment 
of time, greeting us as it comes from the hand of 
God with his benediction, stays just long enough to 
deliver its message, to fulfill its mission, and then 
it passes on. 

" Moments, days, and the longer periods of time 
thus come to us, every one with a personal message 
to each individual soul. Childhood and youth, 
manhood and age, each has for each of us its appro- 



136 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

priate gift, endowment, occupation, and passes on, 
leaving; us in the hands of that which shall come 
next. And it becomes us to do now the work ap- 
propriate to the present season, not impatient to 
leave it before the time, nor seeking to extend it l 
beyond its appointed limits. There is a time for 
preparation and a time for work. There is a time 
to assume heavy responsibilities and a time to lay 
them down. The important changes of life may- 
well make us thoughtful. At such seasons our 
minds naturally go back to ask of the days that 
are past whether we have been wise and faithful in 
the use we have made of them, and forward with! 
some questionings as to what lies before us. We 
can hardly pass the invisible boundary that sepa-i 
rates one year from another without some unusual 
seriousness of mind. 

" We may not be saddened. We may be full of 
happy anticipations. If we have sought earnestly 
to do our duty we have nothing to fear, and there 
are inward satisfactions which can be weighed to ; 
our advantage against any amount of worldly dis- 
comfort or success. This we feel, and more thanr 
this, when we look back through any considerable I 
period ; we see how kindly all things have worked 
together, and formed a part of the divinely ordered 
plan of our lives. 

" The secret of success, in the best meaning of 
that sadly abused word, lies in the devotion of our- 
selves to the highest ends, engaging in our life's 
work with all our hearts, using all our faculties* 
taking advantage of all the opportunities that are ' 



MILTON 137 

offered, with a perfect trust in God, doing each 
day the most and best that we can. When the 
time has come for leaving any particular work, 
then we are to submit willingly and gracefully, 
giving up that which is no longer ours, accepting 
the new situation, the new condition which God 
offers, with grateful and affectionate trust. He 
who has labored earnestly through the heat of the 
day may perhaps be pardoned if he should seek 
to bear a lessening burden, or even to rest a little 
amid calmer studies and meditations, before the 
lengthening shadows, which tell him that his day is 
far spent, are quite lost in the night in which no 
man can work. If he cannot put forth his strength 
as he once did, perhaps his mission now may better 
be accomplished by the exercise of a needed pa- 
tience. If he may not influence or control events 
by active efforts, perhaps he may do something 
by a wise forbearance, a gentle tolerance, a greater 
charity to others, a more loving submission to a 
higher and better will than his. If, in the days of 
our strength, we have really sought to act in con- 
cert with the Divine Mind, we must have acquired, 
to some extent, the habit not only of doing what 
we could, but of leaving cheerfully and trustingly 
with Him what we could not do, — the habit of 
seeing his hand everywhere, in the wise ordering, 
the kindly succession, the wonderful adjustment, — 
everywhere change, and yet everything beautiful 
in his time. 

" To this universal and beneficent law of God I 
bow in grateful and joyful obedience. The time is 



138 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

come when it is better for you and for me that a 
younger life should exercise its functions in this 
place. The truths of our religion are as old as the 
throne of God, and can never change. But we are 
all changing. Each new generation has its pecul- 
iar way of viewing even the most sacred subjects. 
There are habits of thought, forms of speech, modes 
of presenting ideas, methods of action, adapted to 
the living, changing minds and characters around 
us. Much of the best inspiration to the young 
comes from the unexpressed and unconscious sym- 
pathy of contemporary minds, growing up under 
similar circumstances, acted upon by the same in- 
fluences, attuned to the same key, and answering 
spontaneously to each other's wants. I have endea- 
vored to keep up with the religious thought and 
sentiment of the day, and have had no occasion to 
complain of any apparent decline of interest, espe- 
cially on the part of the young. But the time has 
come. A new connection promises a better suc- 
cess. I need not say how grateful I am to you 
for all your kindnesses through these many years. 
Nor need I say how grateful to me are the arrange- 
ments that have been made, and how much I shall 
rejoice in everything that may help you and your 
new pastor in continuing what has been the great 
work and hope of my life. 

" I have only to look around me to be admon- 
ished that my time for at least a partial withdrawal 
has come. In this county of Norfolk, among all 
the different denominations, there are, I think, only 
four active ministers of parishes — three Unitarian 



MILTON 139 

and one Episcopal — who were settled where they 
now are when I came here, a little more than 
twenty-five years ago. Great and solemn changes 
have taken place in almost every home since I came 
among you. All who were then aged have passed 
away. Of those who were then as old as I am now, 
only one is living. I have seen those whom we 
then looked upon as young growing old, their num- 
bers diminishing from year to year. I have watched 
the conduct of children in our schools, and followed 
them from the schools to their various callings, 
rejoicing in their success, sorrowing with them in 
their disappointments, but, most of all, watching 
and praying that they mjght grow in those higher 
qualities which bring a dearer satisfaction to the 
heart, which make them in the highest sense useful 
and honored members of society, and which can 
never forsake them. I need not speak here of the 
joy and gratitude with which I have seen young 
persons growing into all manly or womanly virtues 
and graces. I think of them with religious thank- 
fulness, and with inward emotions of love and joy, 
such as fathers and mothers feel in the well-doing 
of their children. What greater cause of thank- 
fulness and rejoicing can we have than to see chil- 
dren whom we have consecrated with the waters of 
a Christian baptism blossoming into boyhood or 
girlhood in the sweetness and the strength of all 
trusting affections, and then emerging into a riper 
manhood or womanhood, with all Christian virtues 
and graces cherished in their hearts, and showing 
themselves in their lives ? 



140 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

"An upright man, going forth in his own con- 
scious integrity of character, an example of truth- 
fulness and honor, seeking only what is right, feel- 
ing his higher wants, and looking to God for the 
strength and the inward life which He alone can 
bestow ; a man whose heart and mind have been 
enlarged by a generous religious culture, by habits 
of fidelity, of kind and gracious deeds, by inward 
consecration and prayer ; having a soul all alive 
with love, with reverence, with faith ; living as in 
the presence of an unseen Power, and coming forth 
from that presence to do the duties of the hour ; in 
the midst of men and evil customs, yet with no spot 
to stain the heaven-like purity of his thought, — 
what an example have we here of the great and 
beneficent law of progression, changing from day 
to day, and yet more beautiful with every succes- 
sive change ! So a young girl, growing up, and 
passing through the different stages of life, in the 
fullness and the charm of womanly maturity, — her 
affections refined and elevated by holy thoughts, 
her love of admiration lost in her sense of God's 
love, her selfishness melted away in the warmth of 
her affection for others, doing with each hour the 
duty which it brings, adorning prosperity with a 
brighter charm, lighting up the darkest experiences 
with the serene faith of a soul on which the light 
of heaven always rests, — she, in her home and her 
sphere, through all the changes which pass over 
her, is as true and as beautiful an image of God's 
kingdom as we can have on earth. 

" Here, in the highest forms that we can imagine, 



I 



MIL TON 141 

arc types of Christian living ; and every one who 
is earnestly seeking and striving after what is high- 
est and best may go on, ' changed into the same 
image,' from one degree of excellence to another 
here, and ' from glory to glory ' hereafter. Far 
away from the attainment of such an end we may 
feel ourselves to be. Slow and saddened by the 
consciousness of many disappointments and failures 
may we be in our progress towards it. But if we 
seek it with all our hearts we shall go on towards 
it, and through all our changing progress God will 
make everything beautiful in his time. Life will 
every year grow richer to us in its hopes and its 
benefactions. Sweeter influences will descend upon 
us from Heaven. Our intercourse with one an- 
other will be more cordial and generous, attended 
by fewer interruptions and purer satisfactions. 

" For twenty-five years I have been laboring, 
according to my ability, as a minister of Christ, as 
a neighbor and friend, to do something to establish 
in your hearts this higher ideal of Christian living, 
and to aid you in making the heavenly vision a 
reality in your lives. I cannot say- that my success 
has at all corresponded to my wishes. I cannot 
feel that, either in my own life or in the life of the 
community, there has been progress enough heaven- 
ward to make it altogether pleasant to dwell on 
the outward and apparent success of my ministry. 
Here, as elsewhere, some have fallen away from all 
apparent regard for the institutions and ordinances 
of our religion ; some have failed to cultivate their 
religious faculties, and to cherish in their hearts 



142 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

the reverence for sacred things, and the faith in 
things unseen and eternal, which alone can cheer 
and comfort and sustain them when all other pos- - 
sessions and hopes shall pass away ; some have ; 
grown worldly and hard and selfish. But there ; 
have been many instances of lives evidently ex- - 
panding in the sunlight of God's love ; minds open- - 
ing like sweet and beautiful flowers in the dews of ' 
his grace ; hearts unfolding into a diviner loveli- 
ness, growing more upright, more thoughtful, more ! 
faithful and beautiful, with the progress of the i 
years. 

" A quarter of a century ago, — those who were 
in middle life then are old now. They who were 
young then are beginning to show marks of age. 
But there are among them those whose hearts will I 
never grow old, — whose sensibilities to all that is 
beautiful and holy, or generous and lovely, become 
more alive with every year that is numbered in 
their calendar. Their faces are turned heaven- 
ward. The light of God's truth and love never 
shines with a more divine illumination around 
them than when they are engaged in their common 
thoughts and labors. Time and change and death i 
can have no power over them, except to help them 
on in their heavenly course, or to set them free 
from earthly obstructions, that they may go forth 
in humility and joy into that world where all the 
prophecies of our nature are fulfilled, and what is 
dimly longed for and struggled for here shall come 
to them as free as the blessed air of heaven. 

" Almost a generation of worshipers have passed I 



MILTON 143 

from these seats since I came among yon. On no 
one of these would I dare, even in thought, to 
sit in judgment. But how many true and loving 
spirits have been refreshed and gladdened by our 
services here on their way through earth to heaven ! 
How many faithful and beautiful lives have found 
strength and comfort here ! The sacred songs, the 
prayers, the associations of this place, have been 
very dear to many a pilgrim who is now among the 
angels of God. Many a time should I have been 
utterly discouraged as I have looked around and 
seen what dominion the world was gaining, were it 
not that I have been cheered by words of encour- 
agement and love spoken to me by dear and saintly 
ones from the very borders of eternity. I seem to 
see them now, — the young, leaving behind them, in 
the homes which they had blessed with the fra- 
grance of their own immortal affections, the old in 
the serene and holy trust of souls matured and 
ripened for the kingdom of heaven ; men and wo- 
men in the fullness and freshness of life, with strong 
hearts and generous aims, while engaged in enter- 
prises of private benefaction or for the general good 
cut off by what seemed to us an untimely death. 
Once they were with us here. Their zeal encour- 
aged us. Their enterprise stimulated us. Their 
patience added to our powers of endurance. Their 
faith opened to us visions of a more transcendent 
loveliness. Their unworldliness rebuked and at- 
tracted us. If there were nothing else left but only 
this cloud of heavenly witnesses, I could not feci 
that life had been poor and profitless and vain. 



144 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" There are hopes which the eye cannot see 
There are influences at work which the busy world 
does not recognize. There is a divinity within and 
around us which will not leave us helpless or com- 1 
f ortless. As centuries ago among the hills and by ; 
the sea of Galilee, so to-day and in the midst of us 
there is a holy one ready to heal our sicknesses, I 
to raise our dead into a blessed and eternal life, • 
to preach to us a better gospel than the world has i 
ever accepted yet. Oh, when shall we learn to i 
recognize his presence and his power ? When 
shall we learn to give ourselves to him as to the i 
highest joy and hope which the soul of man can 
receive ? 

" In these five-and-twenty years since I came 
among you whole families have passed on into 
other worlds. We have all changed. But, so far 
as we have been faithful to our trust, every change 
has been a blessing. The heavens are peopled now 
by those who were once our personal friends ; and, if 
our hearts have been kept alive to spiritual things, 
it is not difficult for us to feel that we live in the 
midst of heavenly beings. He who lives thus has 
transferred his allegiance from this to a higher 
realm. If, by the consecration of ourselves to what 
is highest and holiest, we live and believe in him 
who is the resurrection and the life, we shall never 
die. Death is but the messenger to lead us up- 
ward into life. We shall all be changed, but 
only that this corruptible may put on incorrup- 
tion. When death approaches us, it turns every 
mortal thing about us which it touches into ashes, 



MILTON 145 

but only that it may set free the soul, and help it 
to rise in its spiritual body to its eternal home. 
We shall all be changed, and then, in the gladsome 
experience of our hearts, in the light which shines 
down from higher worlds to illuminate and sanc- 
tify to us the changing incidents through which we 
have passed, we shall see a richer meaning, a more 
sacred presence, a diviner beauty, in every experi- 
ence here ; and we shall see, as we never could be- 
fore, how He who maketh everything beautiful in 
his time has glorified the last and greatest change 
with his crowning mercy when He lifts us up, re- 
deemed and sanctified by his love, into that higher 
world, and places us there ' among his saints in 
glory everlasting.' " 

Of his life in Milton Dr. Morison wrote in the 
brief autobiography which has been several times 
quoted : — 

" In the autumn of 1845, I resigned my office in 
New Bedford, and in January, 1846, became the 
pastor of the First Congregational Parish in Mil- 
ton, Mass., where I have continued to this day. 
The society is small. The duties of the place have 
not been oppressive. The people have been very 
indulgent. Among them I have found men and 
women whom it is a great joy and privilege to 
know as friends. I could ask for no higher or more 
exciting employment than to do everything in my 
power for their instruction and improvement. If 
there has been little to feed or gratify any lower 
ambition, there has been a great deal to cherish 



146 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

the best affections. The highest thought that I 
have been able to reach has always found a hospi- 
table welcome. My one aim in life has been to 
prove myself in all things a faithful minister of 
Christ, and, even in the apparently narrow sphere 
in which my lot has been cast, I have found abun- 
dant opportunity for the exercise of all my facul- 
ties. I have written and published a commentary 
on the Gospel of St. Matthew, 1 and had hoped to 
extend the work so as to include the other evange- 
lists. At different times I have edited the ' Chris- 
tian Register,' and ' The Religious Magazine ' or 
'Unitarian Review.' But the work of an editor 
was never to my taste. The pulpit, the parochial 
labors, and, above all, the studies, of a Christian 
minister, have had for me greater attractions than 
any other office or calling. They have been to me 
always a sufficient stimulus and reward. When 
drawn away from them for a season by failing 
health, it has been an unspeakable happiness to 
come back to them again." 2 

1 Disquisitions and Notes on the Gospels : Matthew. Boston, 
1860. 

2 History of Peterborough, p. 191.* 



VI 

SLAVERY 

Though, on his settlement at Milton, Mr. Mori- 
son entered upon the long, quiet period of his own 
life, the country was at this time passing into 
throes of excitement such as it had never experi- 
enced befox-e. The agitation of the slavery ques- 
tion was soon to reach its height, and to be fol- 
lowed by the ordeal of civil war. During his 
Western journey Mr. Morison had seen a little of 
slavery, and the impressions which it made upon 
him were briefly noted in his journal. In Decem- 
ber, 1843, he had accompanied Robert Swain to 
Savannah, and had there been present at a slave 
auction. He always associated his father's trou- 
bles in Louisiana with the existence of slavery 
there. He had the Scotch capacity to abhor those 
things which he thought wrong, and he exercised 
this feeling towards slavery. On the other hand, 
his early association with Judge Smith had given 
him a respect for law, and few men of his profes- 
sion have begun under stronger legal influences. 1 

1 Two prominent lawyers were once speaking of his Life of 
Jeremiah Smith. One said that he thought it was the best life of 
a lawyer ever written by a layman, to which the other replied that 
he would not make the qualification. 



148 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

While in sympathy with their object, he thoroughly 
disapproved of the methods of the extreme aboli- 
tionists, and would hardly allow " The Liberator " 
in his house. 

" The Christian World " of January 27, 1844, 
contained an address, signed by eighty-five Unita- 1 
rian ministers of Great Britain, asking their breth- 1. 
ren in America to act " in behalf of the unhappy 
slave." A month later a meeting was held in I 
Boston, at which a committee was appointed to 
prepare a reply, Mr. Morison being one of this 
committee. His views were expressed in the fol- 
lowing extract from a letter to Rev. A. P. Pea- 
body, chairman of the committee, dated March 
2d: — 

" We all agree in the sad conviction that slavery 
in its political influence, more than all other sub- 
jects, threatens to upturn the foundation of our 
government ; that, in its moral and religious bear- 
ings, it is a grievous wrong to master and slave ; ! 
and that, as it is in violation of the fundamental 
principles of Christian duty, it must, if continued 
beyond the absolute necessity of the case, be at- 
tended with consequences the most disastrous. But 
at the same time it is an evil which has sunk into 
the heart of society, and is so woven into the whole 
social organization that, while we all feel that some- 
thing must be done, our views as to the particular 
mode of action are perhaps almost as various as 



I 



SLAVERY 149 

our names. As it respects any political action for 
the abolition of slavery, except in the District of 
Columbia, the citizens of the free States have no 
more right to interfere than the citizens of Great 
Britain. As a political body each. State has the 
entire control of this matter within itself, and is 
exceedingly jealous of any interference from with- 
out. Our influence, therefore, must be a moral 
influence, accompanied always by that deep sym- 
pathy and Christian kindness which, taking into 

j account all the difficulties of their position, may 
find its way to the hearts of our brethren at the 
South. How this may be done most effectually 
is a question which each of us must consider for 
himself. We have too sacred a reverence for lib- 

• erty of thought and action to make particular views 
in respect to the course to be pursued, or a partic- 

1 alar mode of conduct, a test of religious character. 

; Solemn deliberation is required by us all on a sub- 

i ject of so fearful a character as this, and, as we 
must answer to a higher tribunal than that of 
man, we must be faithful to our own convictions. 

' At the same time, we must each of us allow to our 
brethren the same liberty that we cannot in our 
own case surrender without a crime, and be careful 

*in our judgments lest we also be judged." 

These views were subsequently embodied in a 
letter which was signed by one hundred and thirty 
ministers and sent to England. 

On another occasion, when it was proposed that 
the American Unitarian Association should take 



150 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

direct action on the subject of slavery, Mr. Mori- 
son objected, and the following draft of a report, 
prepared by himself for publication, but which 
does not seem to have been used, shows his 
views : — 

" Mr. Morison moved that the resolutions be 
laid upon the table. Not that he objected to the 
views they expressed in respect to slavery ; he be- 
lieved in them all, and not only believed, but was 
ready to express his belief at the North and at the 
South. But he was opposed to any action on the 
subject by this body, because he considered that 
any such action must be unfavorable to the cause 
of freedom, and entirely foreign to the objects for 
which this Association was formed. 

" And, before entering at large upon these rea- 
sons, he covdd not but say that the measures seemed 
to him very far from being of a magnanimous or 
courageous character. If the brother who proposed 
them were himself going to the South, and chose 
to offer such resolutions that he might have the 
authority of this body to sustain him in his course, 
or if on reaching a Southern city he chose to make 
public proclamation of his anti-slavery views, it 
might be all very well, as he alone must bear the 
consequences of his act. Or if those of the Asso- 
ciation here present choose to pursue such a course, 
let them go, and if need be die ; they would at least 
die for a good object, and there would be something 
of courage and magnanimity in their conduct. But 
it did seem a cowardly and unmanly course for us, 



SLAVERY 151 

four hundred miles from a slave-holding commu- 
nity, out of all danger, to be passing resolutions, 
the whole burden and danger of which must fall on 
a few of our brethren, who, with a fidelity and zeal 
at least equal to ours, and with discouragements, 
Heaven knows, sufficiently severe, are laboring at 
r the South for the advancement of Christian truth. 

" But, beyond this, Mr. Morison believed these 
resolutions would effectually shut out the only im- 
portant influence that we could exercise at the 
South in behalf of freedom. The influence must 
be principally a social influence, and arise from 
a free, friendly, and Christian interchange of 
thought and feeling with our brethren there. There 
can be at present no public speaking there against 
slavery. None of our abolitionists from the North 
dare attempt it. But the moment we pass these 
resolutions, or any others on the subject which 
properly express the feelings of this body, we 
make a public declaration which fixes the suspi- 
cion of the South on every member of this body, 
and so cuts off at once any and all influence that 
,we otherwise might have in the matter. 

" By sending with every Unitarian missionary 
to a slave-holding place a remonstrance against sla- 
very, and thus virtually making a renunciation of 
slavery, at least in principle, the condition on which 
they are to receive our aid, we mistake the end for 
the means. What missionary board ever exacted 
from the heathen that they should give up their 
idols, or their respect for them, as the only condi- 
tion on which they should be permitted to receive 



152 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

missionaries ? or what temperance body, in deal- 
ing with an intemperate community, ever made 
total abstinence on the part of that community the 
condition on which they should be permitted to 
have lecturers ? We send out missionaries to con- 
vert the souls of the heathen, and thereby destroy 
idolatry. We send out lecturers to touch men's 
hearts and persuade them to take the pledge. 
And we send out Unitarian preachers to the South 
to teach the great doctrines of Christian truth and 
duty ; and if, as we most solemnly believe, slavery 
is an institution at war with Christian truth and 
duty, it must, with dueling, drinking, gambling, 
and every other evil institution or habit, flee from 
before their presence. The abolition of every un- 
holy and unchristian institution is the end to be 
accomplished by the diffusion of Christianity, and 
not a preliminary condition on which alone we 
will permit the means of extending Christian truth 
to be employed. 

" In the second place, Mr. Morison objected to 
these and to all general resolutions, not called for 
by particular circumstances, as foreign to the pur- 
pose of tin's institution. We are the Unitarian 
and not an Anti-slave?'^ Association. We meet 
for the discussion of other subjects. If circum- 
stances should grow out of the regular action of 
this society bringing the subject before us as a 
practical question, then it is our duty to consider 
it so far as relates to the legitimate action of this 
society. The subject of slavery is one of such ab- 
sorbing interest and importance that it cannot be 



SLAVERY 153 

discussed in its broad grounds and relations as the 
subordinate subject in an association like this. If 
made a part of our regular discussions, it must 
from its character become the principal part, to 
the exclusion of all other subjects, and this Asso- 
ciation becomes virtually an anti-slavery associa- 
tion. Are we prepared for this result ? 

" But it is said that silence speaks in favor of 
slavery. But is this true ? We as an association 
pass no resolutions on intemperance, but do we 
therefore lend it our sanction ? We pass no reso- 
lutions on dueling, or stealing, or lying, but do we 
therefore sanction them? Worldliuess and self- 
ishness are the great and crying sins of the times, 
existing in our midst, lying at the foundation of 
slavery and of almost everything that is evil in 
society. We pass no resolutions on them. And 
why not ? Because, though they must be destroyed 
when our doctrines are established in the souls of 
men, yet as distinct objects of action they do not 
fall in with the purposes of this Association. If we 
wish, to pass resolutions on those subjects we join 
)r establish a temperance or moral-reform society. 
A.nd so, if we would pass resolutions on slavery, let 
is, apart from this Association, join or establish an 
mti-slavery society. 

" But the strongest reason why resolutions like 
hose now proposed should not be adopted or even 
entertained here is, not only that they are foreign 
o the objects of this Association, but that they 
xre entirely inconsistent with the very principles 
>n which it was established. This Association was 



154 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

got up in opposition to all authoritative associa- 
tions, and on what we consider the fundamental 
principles of the Reformation. The Bible is the 
only external authority that we recognize ; and' 
the ground on which this Association was formed ■ 
was, that, with that as a guide, every man must be 
permitted to decide for himself, not only in mat- 1 
ters of faith and doctrine, but in matters of duty.. 
We rejected all creeds, and every device by which 
religious associations, under whatever name, would i 
bind the judgments or consciences of men. Yet, I 
when we adopt these or any other resolutions of a 
similar character, we adopt an anti-slavery creed, 
and use all our strength as a public body to bind 
the consciences of our brethren. I would resist 
with all my heart and might the very first encroach- 
ments of this nature. In claiming the right as a 
public body to pass these resolutions we claim the 
right to pass any l'esolutions on matters of Chris- 
tian doctrine or Christian duty, and thereby effec- 
tually to exclude from the Association those who 
cannot in conscience lend the influence of their 
names to articles of doctrine or principles of duty 
which they cannot approve, or which, it may be, 
from their very souls they abhor. It has been a \ 
matter of surprise to me that they who would 
stand forth as the peculiar and exclusive advocates 
of universal freedom should insist on passing reso- 
lutions which, however dear to them as principles 
of private faith and duty, yet cannot be passed by 
this body, and thus imposed upon its members, 
without doing all that we as an association can do 



SLAVERY 155 

to violate the very first principles of religious and 
moral freedom. It may be said that they only 
express our opinion ; still it is an opinion which 
thus comes forth with the sanction and authority 
of this body, and expels from the body every con- 
scientious man who cannot yield to it his assent, 
and expels him with all the disgrace that we as an 
association can inflict, — with the disgrace of enter- 
taining opinions which we have branded as unchris- 
tian and untrue. And what more can any religious 
organization in the land effect ? 

" I must therefore most solemnly protest against 
any resolution which, however innocent in itself, 
cannot be passed by this body without violating the 
I great — and what we should regard as above all 
i others the precious — principle of moral and reli- 
gious freedom, on which and for the advancement 
' of which this Association was established. I con- 
r sider it a question of vital importance, — a ques- 
tion on which, not perhaps the existence, but, what 
should be dearer far, the very design and purpose 
of the existence, of this Association depend." 

Mr. Morison had the highest admiration for 
Daniel Webster. He used to say that he could 
repeat the whole of the first speech he heard him 
make ; the speech was little more than a motion 
for an adjournment, and he felt that the power of 
these few words more than repaid him for going 
to the meeting. But when, in his 7th of March 
speech (1850), Mr. Webster advocated the Fugi- 



156 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

tive Slave Law, Mr. Morison, at that time editor 
of " The Christian Register," in a leading editorial; 
expressed himself as follows : — 

" On questions of national expediency or consti- 
tutional law we should not venture to enter into 
any discussion with Mr. Webster. We go to himi 
as pupils to a master to learn the political bearing: 
and relations of political measures. But as respon-i 
sible conductors of a religious press, connected i 
with a most intelligent and influential body of> 
Christians, we must be wholly unfit for our place 
unless we are competent to speak of the moral 
character and influence of great public measures. 
And it is with a keen sensation of sorrow andi 
regret that we look at Mr. Webster's speech from> 
this point of view. We have been educated from 
childhood to regard him as the great man of the 
nation. We have been accustomed to find in his 
speeches expressions of patriotism, and of a burn- 
ing enthusiasm for liberty, which are strengthened 
rather than impaired by the qualifications suggested; 
by a broad, far-seeing political wisdom. We have*! 
followed him in his public course through allij 
changes of political fortune with a pride and con- 
fidence such as we have had in no other man. 
When his adherence to an unworthy administra-i 
tion brought down upon him the fierce denuncia-i 
tion of his party, we saw in all this an evidence 
of his independence, his superiority to party disci- 
pline, and his devotion to the great interests of the 
country. If he has sometimes been silent when 



SLAVERY 157 

we could have wished to hear his voice, we were 
inclined to think that he knew best the power of 
silence as well as the power of speech. In the vol- 
umes which contain what he has said on the most 
important public occasions through a period of 
nearly forty years, there is, it has seemed to us, 
nothing which can hereafter sully the fame of a 
sincere and enlightened Christian statesman. He 
has spoken of the principles of Christianity as the 
Basis of all true legislation ; and in the last of his 
speeches before leaving home he spoke, as no one 
but he can speak, of the roused moral sentiment 
of the world, — a power mightier than despotism. 

"But in his speech of last week on the great 
moral question of the age, we miss the decided rec- 
ognition of its moral character which Mr. Web- 
ster's previous speeches would lead us to expect ; 
and, as if it were purely a matter of political expe- 
diency, he even goes so far as to advocate a law 
which must come directly in conflict with the moral 
convictions of the great body of the people in the 
free States. We at the North believe that slavery 
is morally wrong. We could not, unless for the 
purpose of setting him free, or under some over- 
powering necessity, hold a slave without violating 
our convictions of moral and religious duty. This 
is the deeply-fixed moral sentiment of the great 
mass of intelligent and conscientious men through- 
out the free States. Now it is not right, and no 
legal enactments can make it right, to aid another 
in doing that which it is wrong for us to do. If it is 
wrong for us to lie, or steal, or murder for our own 



158 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

benefit, it is wrong for us to help another to lie, or 
steal, or niurder for his benefit. Here is a position 
in morals which can admit of no dispute. If, then, 
we cannot, without violating our moral convictions, 
hold slaves ourselves, we cannot, without doing 
equal violence to our moral convictions, take active 
measures to assist others to hold them. 

" It is a perilous thing to bring the laws of man 
into conflict with what the purest and most enlight- 
ened members of a community regard as the laws 
of God. No despotism has ever been able long to 
survive such an experiment. In a free country the 
government which shall attempt it will find its laws 
trampled upon with a degree of moral indignation 
and horror proportioned to the respect with which 
they have been accustomed to regard them. 

" But what is to be done ? Must we not fulfill 
the conditions of the Constitution? To this we 
reply, that we are ready to fulfill them according 
to the jwovisions in the Constitution. If these 
provisions are inoperative, it is a misfortune to \ 
those for whose benefit they were made, — a mis- 
fortune arising out of a state of things which nei- 
ther of the parties to the agreement contemplated 
at the time, and which therefore neither party is 
bound to make up for to the other in order to 
prove its good faith in the transaction. No fraud 
has been practiced upon the South. Since the 
adoption of the Federal Constitution a change of 
moral feeling in regard to slavery — a change 



SLAVERY 159 

which we can no more control than we can control 
the laws of the physical universe — has come over 
us in common with most enlightened Christian 
nations ; and in consequence of this change the 
provisions of the Constitution are not sufficient to 
answer the end for which they were designed. 
And no other provisions that can be devised will 
be sufficient. In this particular Mr. Calhoun is 
right. ' It is impossible to execute any law of 
Congress until the people shall cooperate.' Are 
we, then, wanting in good faith to the people of the 
South because, while we allow them to use all the 
provisions made by the Constitution, they cannot 
thereby secure their object ? If two parties agree 
not only upon particular ends, but upon the means 
of securing those ends, and if without their inten- 
tional agency great changes in society, occur which 
render those means entirely insufficient so far as 
relates to the interest of one of the parties, the 
other party certainly is not in equity responsible for 
that result, or bound to make it up by sacrifices 
which had not entered the mind of either party at 
the time the agreement was made. Each party to 
every agreement or compact extending through a 
series of years must run risks of this kind for 
which the other party is not accountable. As an 
act of good faith, therefoi'e, we are not bound to 
go beyond the articles of the Constitution in order 
to redeem our pledge in this matter. 

" It is, we repeat, a perilous act so to legislate 
that the laws of a powerful, intelligent, and moral 



160 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

people shall be on one side, and their deliberate 
religious convictions of duty on the other. Nothing 
can do so much to break down all respect for law, 
and undermine the authority of government. The 
statesman who overlooks this fact leaves out of : 
sight a consideration which it is fatal to neglect. . 
We owe allegiance to the Constitution and laws of 
the State subject to the higher allegiance which we 
owe to the Constitution and laws of the United I 
States ; and we owe allegiance to the constitution i 
and laws of the United States subject to the still 
higher allegiance which we owe to the laws of 
God ; and to neglect the last of these is to neglect 
that which must have an authoritative and con- 
trolling influence over the whole, and which, above 
all the rest, is binding upon the conscience of f 
legislators and individuals." 

When the bill had become a law, he believed in 
what the Quakers call " passive resistance," by 
which, refusing it all countenance and support, 
the moral forces of society should bring their con- 
demnation to bear upon it and upon those who up- 
held it. He afterwards wrote : " If the counsels of 
those who advocated forcible resistance had gen- 
erally prevailed, the Civil War would have been 
precipitated upon us here and then in New Eng- 
land, and we would have been the rebels. The 
weight of the government and the overwhelming 
Union sentiment of the nation would have crushed 



SLAVERY 101 

us to atoms, and slavery would have ruled over 
the life of this people as it never had done before. 
So far as slavery was concerned, I look back on 
that heated and trying period of editorial respon- 
sibility with great satisfaction." 

When, four years later, Anthony Burns was ar- 
rested in Boston as a fugitive slave to be taken 
back to the South, and the Massachusetts militia 
were called out to hold in check the people who 
would have rescued him, Mr. Morison preached a 
sermon which offended more than one member of 
his parish, but which, after more than forty years, 
is interesting both as showing the feelings of those 
troubled times and the character of the man : — 

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the 
holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his 
glory; and before him shall he gathered all nations. — Matt, 
xxv. 31, 32. 

" After the events of the past week, there is but 
one subject possible for us this morning. If those 
events could be taken up out of the heated emo- 
tions of the day into the scene foreshadowed in 
our text, and made to appear, as they will appear, 
in the light of that holy presence, it would be the 
best use that can be made of our morning services. 
But it is not for one oppressed by human weak- 
nesses, hemmed in by our human ignorance, and 
open to the passions and excitements of the hour, 
to undertake here to anticipate the calm decisions 
of that pure and august tribunal. 



162 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" There are times when it is a relief to look up 
from earth to heaven, to pour out our souls in 
prayer, or refresh them amid high and holy objects 
of meditation. In sickness and death, when we are 
painfully bowed down by a sense of human weak- 
ness and mortality, it is something to be permitted 
to look up to Him who hath neither beginning of 
days nor end of life, and to still the tumultuous 
throbbings of our grief by resting on the peaceful 
bosom of his eternal and unchanging love. So, 
without apparent cause, there are seasons of de- 
pression when the world seems poor and life hardly 
worth the having, and objects which we once val- 
ued lie despised around us, and it seems as if there 
were nothing here to call out one fresh thought or 
generous affection. Then it is a relief to look up 
from the wintry barrenness and desolation around 
us to the pure skies and shining stars, and to 
think of the serene abodes and immortal joys that 
await the weary and the faithf id beyond their flam- 
ing bounds. We love at such times to think of a 
world where there is no weariness or pain, no dis- 
appointment or injustice, no succession of vain and 
heartless pursuits, no hollow professions, or clash- 
ing of selfish interests. Then we look even to the 
judgments of Heaven with a sense of consolation 
and relief. 

" So, in national sorrows, when a people ai*e 
robbed of their dearest privileges by the hand of for- 
eign oppression, and the bravest and noblest of the 
land are exposed on scaffolds, or buried in prisons, 
or driven into exile by the cruel and inhuman acts 



SLAVERY 1G3 

of foreign power, they can at least turn to the All- 
merciful One, and, commending to him their right- 
eous cause, take comfort in the thought that He is 
for them though all the powers of earth and hell 
may be combined against them. And in seasons 
of national profligacy, when public affairs seem all 
to be going wrong, and the national faith and 
honor, and the future well-being of millions who 
shall come after us, are compromised by laws 
enacted from motives of personal ambition, — so 
long as we do all that we can to resist and prevent 
these laws in their passage and in their evil conse- 
quences, we may look up with a hopeful trust to 
Him who overrules all human affairs, and who 
often, by means which we can neither foresee nor 
devise, confounds the designs of the ungodly. 
Amid the calamities and sorrows which are brought 
upon us by unjust and cruel laws, — when the 
oppressed cry and find no helper, and on the side 
of the oppressor is power, and even the tribunals 
of justice become instruments of oppression and 
the law itself a calamity and a curse, — it is a 
relief to turn from these human tribunals, where 
wrongs are enforced, to the pure and righteous 
judgments of the Almighty, where all unrighteous 
laws shall be repealed^ and ' the cause that was ill- 
judged shall be judged over again,' and lawgivers 
and judges be called to account, and perfect justice 
be administered with perfect love. 

" And yet there is a feeling at such times that we 
all are involved in the guilt, as we all to some extent 
are the instruments of wrong, and must all share 



164 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

— we and our children — in its consequences. We 
feel that some terrible calamity has fallen upon us 
all, and it is not the least of our sorrows that we 
cannot look up with hopefulness even to God. His 
justice is arrayed against us. His very mercies 
are against us, on the side of the helpless and the 
oppressed. We cannot at such times ask Him to 
bless our native land in its present acts ; for that I 
would be to ask Him to uphold and enforce laws 
which are crushing out the dearest hopes of his 
children. To ask Him to assist and bless us as a 
nation, at such times, is to ask Him to bless and 
countenance the heaviest wrongs that government 
can inflict on the weak and helpless. 

" But, as individuals, we may stand apart. . 
Though, in so much of what we most value and 
look forward to for the security and happiness of '< 
our children, or dread as portents of evil to them, 
we are involved in the common blessing or common 
calamity, and must stand or fall with the country 
in which our lot has been cast, yet, in all that 
relates to our own religious fidelity and sense of 
personal responsibility, we may stand apart ; we 
may look on in mournful silence ; we may refuse 
to lift a hand to enforce what we believe a cruel 
act of injustice ; we may open our homes and our 
hearts to the poor, hunted fugitives from oppres- 
sion ; we may cherish in ourselves, and seek to 
awaken in others, feelings of bitter sorrow, indig- 
nation, and repugnance to acts which ring through 
the air with a sadder dirge than the tolling bells 
of a thousand funerals. And when the Saviour of 



SLA VER Y 1G5 

the world, in the person of one of the least of his 
brethren, is once more betrayed into the hands of 
men, and we feel that ' this is their hour and the 
power of darkness,' we may, in the muteness of 
our despair on the human side, absolve ourselves 
from all participation in the crime, and look up in 
lowliness of heart to the great Judge and Arbiter 
of all. 

" Here, for the present at least, there is no hope. 
A great national crime against one of God's help- 
less creatures, like a great moral eclipse, has sud- 
denly darkened the whole atmosphere around us, 
and peopled the land with its lurid and ill-boding 
shadows. But it is a relief to look up from dark- 
ness and oppression here, to the judgment-seat of 
Heaven and the holy retributions of eternity. It 
is a relief and a comfort to think of the coming of 
the Son of man in his glory, and all the holy an- 
gels with him, when he shall sit on the throne of 
his glory, and before him shall be gathered all na- 
tions. From unjust laws and acts of violence, and 
streets throno-ed with armed men to enforce the 
wrong, and to strengthen the hands of the oppres- 
sor and crush his victim, we turn with a sense of 
relief, and almost of joy, to that pure tribunal before 
which 'the mighty men, and every bondman, and 
every captive,' shall stand ; where no unrighteous 
laws shall be recognized, but their makers judged 
and their victims set free ; where those who have 
refused to assist the least of one of Christ's breth- 
ren, in sickness or in prison, shall hear the sen- 
tence, ' Depart, ye cursed ; ' and they who have 



166 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

visited them and ministered unto them in real 
kindness shall hear the word, ' Come, ye blessed of 
my Father.' ' Inasmuch as ye did it unto one 
of the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto 
me.' 

" It is an unspeakable comfort and relief to 
look up from our narrow, imperfect, and unjust 
tribunals and laws to such a scene as that when 
the Son of man shall come in his glory, and to 
meditate on the principles of justice and mercy 
which enter into his decisions, as he there enforces 
the great laws of his kingdom. 

" The prevalence of the evil makes us indifferent. 
The number of its victims generalizes and weakens 
our emotions. And so we grow hardened to its 
wrongs. But when we take an individual case ; 
when I have heard a slave mother, who had re- 
deemed herself from the land of bondage, speak 
of her children who were still there, without one 
harsh or angry word towards him who kept them 
in what she feared might ruin them body and soul ; 
when I have seen her turn her tearful eyes towards 
heaven with a look of anguish which no tongue 
could express, and then speak of death as her only 
hope in behalf of her children, — speak of her joy 
if she could only know that her daughter was dead, 
in the hands of God and not of man, — I have 
felt, as you also would feel, that slavery has not 
crushed out the dearest sensibilities and affections 
of the heart, or its terrible sense of injustice and 
wrong. 

" But I do not wish to dwell on this sorrowful 



SLAVERY 1G7 

subject ; though, racked and tortured as our feel- 
ings have been during the past week, it is impossi- 
ble to keep it long from our thoughts. 

" How are we to show our allegiance to Christ, 
that we may be prepared to meet him when he shall 
come in his glory ? The test which he has here 
given is one which admits of no doubt. We are to 
remember, and, so far as lies in our power, to assist 
the helpless and the wronged. But suppose that 
human laws forbid us to render such sympathy and 
aid ? Then — it is no divided empire that Christ 
would hold over us. There can be no compro- 
mises there. His authority is supreme ; and by 
his law, not the law of the land, shall we be judged 
hereafter. 

" But, when he was born on earth, he was 
crowded out into a manger, because there was 
no room for him in the inn. And so it has been 
ever since. Amid the busy throngs of men, there 
has been no room for Christ or his religion. The 
places of business too often have no room for him, 
and so his claims and words are crowded out. The 
halls of legislation are full of their own concerns, 
and there is no room for him or his religion there. 
The objects of ambition, our social engagements, 
profligacy and crime among the poor, profligacy 
and wickedness in high places, oppressive and cruel 
institutions upheld by cruel and oppressive laws, 
while we are here in our mortal pilgrimage, leave 
no room in the caravan or the inn for the Saviour 
and his claims, and so he is crowded out. But 
this pilgrimage will soon be ended. Time is but 



168 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

for a moment. The judgments of eternity will 
soon press upon us. And where, then, shall be our 
hopes unless we serve and honor our Master here ? 
In that hour which must come so soon, when human 
hands and hearts can render us no further aid, and 
all our earthly hopes and possessions shall drop 
from us like autumnal leaves, and we must leave 
our pleasant friends and homes and go alone to 
stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, would 
we look hopef ully- to him because he has declared 
to us the words of eternal life, and calls to himself 
them that labor and are heavy-laden ? Then let 
us remember those other words of his, ' I was a 
stranger, and ye took me not in ; sick and in 
prison, and ye visited me not,' and so bear our- 
selves in life that their heavy and terrible condem- 
nation may not fall upon us. The excuses by which 
we soothe our consciences here will be of no avail 
to us there. Before that tribunal the example of 
wicked or thoughtless men, the heated passions, 
or the opinions current among our associates, the 
laws of society or of nations, will not excuse us, 
if we have joined the side of unrighteous authority 
to oppress the poor and the friendless, or to keep 
down the prisoner and him that was ready to per- 
ish. As we hope for the mercy of God here or 
hereafter, so let us now be kind and merciful to 
those who need our help. Let not the toils of so- 
ciety so wind themselves about the heart, repress- 
ing our genuine and best emotions ; let not the 
cares and contests of the world so harden or 
benumb our moral sensibilities, or evil institu- 



SLAVERY 169 

tions and laws so blind and pervert the conscience, 
— that we shall cease to recognize the supreme au- 
thority of the great and primary duties of human- 
ity. Our first allegiance is to God and his laws. 
To violate or disregard them is treason against the 
majesty of Heaven. No human institutions or 
laws can absolve us from that. Not human laws 
first, but first the kingdom of God and his right- 
eousness. 

" A sad thing it is — there is no sadder specta- 
cle under heaven — when the two are arrayed, one 
against the other, man's laws lifting their puny 
strength against the laws of God ; thousands of 
armed men under the laws of the land surrounding 
one poor, helpless fugitive, whose only crime has 
been to seek the liberty which shoidd be dearer to 
us all than life, unmindful of the compassionate 
aid due to one so helpless and so wronged, in the 
face of the most solemn words of Christ and the 
most sacred laws of God, hurrying him off to hope- 
less captivity, — it is the saddest spectacle that 
the sun looks down upon in this world of suffering 
i and of sin. It makes the heart sick. It causes us 
to tremble for the salvation of our country. It 
fills us with unspeakable sorrow for all those who 
take part in these mournful acts. For it is not 
that one unhappy victim is thus consigned to bon- 
dage. This is a small thing. But by this public 
act the whole authority of the nation is called out 
through this one man, to strike at the very heart 
of our common humanity, to overthrow the great 
and eternal principles of all right, and to set at 



170 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

naught the laws of God and all the humane pre- 
cepts and the authority of Christ. It is because 
of the public sanction which it gives to an inhu- 
man wrong, thus enforced by the authority of law 
and the whole power of the nation, that this single 
act jars on our moral and religious sensibilities 
with a keener pang than a hundred murders per- 
petrated against law. The very temple of justice 
is profaned. We feel that there is no longer any 
place left for freedom. In this one person the 
rights of every human being throughout the land 
are violated and set at naught. ' So I returned, 
and considered all the oppressions that are done 
under the sun : and behold the tears of such as 
as were oppressed, and they had no comforter ; and 
on the side of the oppressors there was power; 
but they had no comforter. Wherefore I praised 
the dead which are already dead more than the liv- 
ing which are yet alive.' And from these scenes 
of injustice and violence, is it not a relief to look 
up to the calm and holy judgments of Heaven, ad- 
ministered in perfect love, according to the great 
laws of humanity and kindness which are enjoined 
on every follower of Christ? 

" These, my brethren, are solemn times. They 
force solemn thoughts upon us, and call for solemn 
resolutions. I would lift no hand of violence, and 
would counsel no one to do it, against the law, or 
against those who would enforce the law. They 
who take the sword shall perish by the sword. I 
look on those who, with weapons of war, would 
carry out this unjust and inhuman law, with sor- 



SLAVERY 171 

row, and with silent prayer that God will pity and 
forgive them. It is a fearful thing, whether under 
an inhuman law or against it, to assume an atti- 
tude which may involve the shedding of human 
blood. The appetite for blood is inflamed and 
maddened by that which it feeds upon. Life has 
many ties that are dear and precious, and I have 
no disposition to rush on martyrdom. But, sooner 
than give one look of encouragement to those who 
would enforce such a law, or withhold from the 
prisoner any act or expression of kindness and re- 
lief which it lies in my power to give, — sooner 
than that, let this arm fall from its socket, and this 
poor body be blown into atoms by their murder- 
ous implements of death. For I know that my 
Redeemer liveth ; and, in such a cause, I should 
not fear to stand before him and to see God. 

" One moment let us view this subject in its 
relation to the security of society and to our na- 
tional government. That which makes obedience 
to the law of the land a sin in the sight of God, 
and obedience to God's law a crime in the judg- 
ment of human tribunals, — that which makes 
even those of us who are most loyal to the govern- 
ment feel with sinking hearts that here is injustice 
and cruel oppression embodied in a national law, 
— has, to our human eyes, no bright side. Victory 
on either side is a sorrowful defeat. The triumph 
of law is the triumph of injustice. The triumph 
[ of right and mercy is the triumph of lawless vio- 
, lence. It is all darkness. To disobey the law is 
to weaken the authority of all laws, and let loose 



172 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

all the disorganizing elements that are always ready 
to break out and prey upon society ; to obey it is 
to set at naught the more solemn obligations which 
we owe to those divine principles and sanctions 
which are the only safeguards of society, and with- i 
out which human governments become instruments 
of injustice and oppression, and soon lose their hold < 
on the affections, and their authority over the minds, 
of a people. A sadder alternative could not be • 
presented. Let the scenes of the last week be > 
repeated a few times more, and the sight of Amer- ' 
ican troops in the streets of Boston will be as hate- 
ful, and as much associated with the idea of cruelty 
and oppression, as was the sight of British troops 
in 1775. Every sentiment of national pride and 
affection will be mortified and destroyed. It is 
dangerous for a free people, with a burning sense 
of wrong rankling in their breasts, to become too 
familiar with the sight of armed men called out to 
enforce what they believe to be an act of terrible 
injustice. If, in these times of intense excitement, 
when the strongest possible impressions are burnt 
into the very soul and men become reckless of life, 
— if, at such times, the flag of our Union, to which 
all eyes are turned, is unfolded over the place 
which serves as the prison and the judgment-hall 
of one whose only crime has been that he was born 
with the love of liberty, and so fled from bondage ; 
if the most conspicuous office of our national flag 
is, not to wave proudly in the forefront of the 
battle for liberty, but to lead a poor, trembling 
fugitive back to his captivity ; if it is to be, not an 



SLAVERY 173 

; ensign of freedom thrown gladly to the breeze amid 
I the proud acclamations of those who love to honor 
it, but hanging- heavily over the prison-house of the 
1 slave, to seal his doom, and extinguish the last 
I hope of freedom that has dawned upon him, — then 
it will be time that it should be clothed in mourn- 
ing, and, with muffled drums, and funeral dirges, 
and tolling- bells, follow the coffin of all true man- 
hood and liberty to their dishonored tomb. But, 
' before that hour shall come, ' tear the tattered 
; ensign down.' Trample it in the dust. Let not 
■the flag which has served to kindle the hopes of a 
great and glorious nation be put to such uses of 
infamy and shame. 

" But I will not, even in this dark hour, indulge 
in such forebodings. There is a nobler spirit still 
'living and immortal among us. The union of lib- 
erty and law for which so many lives have been 
spent, and which once seemed so firmly established 
on these Western shores, is not gone. In the words 
'of the great and honored chief who led our armies 
in those perilous times, when, though feeble and 
few, we dared to confront the mightiest empire on 
earth, and march with naked and bleeding- feet 
through wintry snows in defense of human rights, 
— in the words of that great chief, ' Inwoven as is 
the love of liberty with every ligament of your 
(hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to 
fortify or confirm the attachment.' By that great 
and honored name, we will cherish it still. Even 
wicked laws shall not crush it out. Its old fires 
are not extinguished. Every breeze of popular 



174 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

commotion, like those which have been created by 
the aggressions of slavery during the past season, 
will only fan it into a more intense flame. These < 
laws will be repealed. Its beacon-lights will flame « 
again from every hill-top ; and our national gov- • 
ernment, returning once more to its great office of i 
framing laws to protect the rights and liberties of i 
all, shall reach out its beneficent and protecting : 
care over remote settlements, till the wilderness ; 
from sea to sea shall resound with the hum of free 
industry and enterprise ; and the peculiar office of 
our nation among the nations of the earth shall be, 
like that of Christ himself, to give liberty to the 
captive, to break every yoke of the oppressor, and 
let the oppressed go free. And what a mission 
will it be ! With what emotions of honor and 
pride shall we go with our national banner to the 
uttermost parts of the earth ! The oppressed every- 
where will hail its coming with acclamations of 
gladness, and follow it as it departs with grateful 
benedictions. No nation ever set out on a career 
of glory with such advantages, ' except these bonds.' 
Let no recreancy on the part of her sons, no miser- 
able entanglements of party ties, or electioneering 
intrigues, or plausible claims of injustice and estab- 
lished wrong, ever dissolve the allegiance which we 
owe to her, and by which we are bound to defend 
her from every act which can tarnish her purity 
and her honor. Then will our country be, like the 
good Samaritan among the nations of the earth, — 
nay, like Christ himself, — the refuge of them that 
labor and are heavy-laden. When the Son of 



SLAVERY 175 

man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels 
with him, in the laws of righteous retribution which 
follow the conduct of nations, he will recognize 
her beneficent mission and will bless her. ' I was 
an hungered, and ye gave me meat ; I was thirsty, 
and ye gave me drink ; I was a stranger, and ye 
took me in ; naked, and ye clothed me ; I was sick, 
and ye visited me ; I was in prison, and ye came 
unto me. Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one 
of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it 
unto me.' Advancing centuries shall witness our 
national greatness, peace within our walls, and 
prosperity within our palaces. And, if the day 
which comes to nations shall at last come to her, 
when her bulwarks and her defenses shall be 
broken down, true to the last, her influence will 
outlive her existence ; and her example will every- 
where continue to bring hope to the captive, and 
to nations struggling for liberty and law, as the 
light of some distant star continues to shine upon 
us in all its purity ages after it has itself ceased to 
exist." 



VII 

THE WAR 

The beginning of the war put Dr. Morison's 
feelings and his legal duties on the same side, and < 
he entered into the struggle with all the earnest- I 
ness which was possible in a non-combatant. He 
early offered to go to the front as chaplain, but 
he was now fifty-three years old and was never 
asked to go. He followed closely the whole course 
of the momentous struggle, and it wore on him in 
the most trying way. Two sermons may be repro- 
duced here in illustration of his thoughts. 

The first was preached on Fast Day, April 4, 
1861, after the inauguration of President Lincoln 
and before the fall of Fort Sumter. 

Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us : consider, and be- i 
hold our reproach. 

The crown is fallen from our head : woe unto us that we have 
sinned. 

Turn thou us unto Thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned; 
renew our days as of old. — Lamentations v. 1, 16, 21. 

" It has been customary on this day of fasting 
and prayer to confess our sins, personal and na- 
tional, to seek the divine forgiveness by sincere 
repentance and earnest efforts at amendment. It i 



THE WAR 177 

has also been not an unusual thing to dwell on our 
national condition and prospects more fully than 
would be suitable in our Sunday services. 

" As regards our public affairs, there has been 
no time within seventy years when apparently there 
has been such ground for humiliation and distress. 
It is not merely that one eighth part of the nation 
has separated from the rest, and put itself in atti- 
tude of vehement hostility toward them, but the 
principles on which the separation is made are 
such that, if we assent to them, we allow that we 
have no government left. This grand fabric of 
! government, which for more than seventy years 
has helped us on in a career of growth such as the 
world never saw before us, is all a mistake. The 
great men who framed our Constitution, and the 
great men who have administered it for more than 
two generations, have all been acting under an 
illusion. The power which has made itself felt 
throughout the world, which has grown stronger as 
the thrones of monarchs fell, which has extorted 
from kings a reluctant recognition of its place 
among the mightiest nations of the earth, has been 
all a pretense and a delusion. Our government 
has in fact no power. It has no authority to exe- 
cute its own laws except when there is no vigorous 
opposition to them. Any party to a compact may 
withdraw on its own terms, taking away whatever 
t can lay its hands upon, in spite of the terms of 
igreement by which it has solemnly pledged itself 
to abide. These doctrines, subversive of all pop- 
ular government, and which can end only in civil 



178 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

anarchy, or a military despotism which crushes out 
all human rights, are practically enforced in one 
part of our country ; and, what is far more alarm- 
ing to us, they are openly defended or covertly 
acquiesced in by many persons in almost every part 
of the land. 

" Here is the great, and, if it be not put down, 
the fatal peril of our day. All the Gulf States — 
nay, all the slave States — may leave us ; and if 
we who are left are only sound in our principles 
we shall, in less than twenty years, be a far more 
powerful nation than we ever have been yet. In 
numbers, in wealth, in all the elements of material 
prosperity, we shall be greater ; and in moral power 
we shall be without the one source of internal irri- i 
tation and weakness which is at war not only with 
the fundamental axioms of a free government, but 
with the whole spirit and tendency of our modern 
civilization, — with its literature, its philosophy, 
its Christian sentiment, and its practical philan- 
thropy. 

" But if we accept the doctrines which, origi- 
nating with Mr. Calhoun thirty years ago, and 
denounced by all our great statesmen and patriots 
then, are now largely in favor, and bearing their 
legitimate fruits in the disruption of this Union, 
we can only divide and separate till we have become 
utterly disintegrated, and the noblest edifice ever 
erected for the security of man and his rights will 
lie around us a mass of rubbish and of ruin. 

" Here is the momentous peril that is pressing 
upon us now, and which, as it seems to me, some 



THE WAR 179 

of our best and most conservative men are virtu- 
ally helping to advance. A foreign government 
takes possession of one of the smallest fishing-ves- 
sels on the banks of Newfoundland, and the whole 
power of the nation rouses itself to vindicate the 
lights of the obscurest of its citizens. But let one 
of our own States imprison our citizens without 
law or against the law, or lay its traitorous hands 
on a national vessel, arsenal, or mint, and we are 
told that the government has no power to vindicate 
its rights. Now, if these principles are once recog- 
nized and carried out, we not only have no national 
government, and can have none, but we have no 
state government, — in short, no county or town 
government. If these principles are true, the in- 
habitants of a school district may take possession 
of a schoolhouse, drive out the teacher, and ap- 
propriate the building to their own use ; or those 
who live near the almshouse may take possession 
of that and establish themselves, as rightful occu- 
pants, within its comfortable quarters, and there 
will be no lawful authority to dislodge and punish 
them. 

" The peril is one which lies very deep ; but, un- 
less it is removed, the last hope of man for a free 
government must pass away from the earth. 

" Now, what is to be done ? How is the evil to 
be remedied ? Not by the exercise of military force, 
unless that sad necessity should be brought upon 
us in such a way that there is no alternative. War, 
even civil war, with all its dark and terrible train 
of evils, is not the greatest calamity that can fall 






180 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 



upon a people. But unless there is a quickening 
spirit of patriotism pervading the people of the 
free States, at least as a controlling influence ; un- 
less there are consistent and Christian ideas of gov- 
ernment at the basis of our institutions, and high . 
sentiments of public duties and of national honor as 
the leading motive in this whole movement, — the 
violent exercise of military force would do us no 
good. It would only add the atrocities of civil war 
to the elements of confusion and disorder already 
existing. Such a method of coercion might, be 
justified by the essential ideas which underlie all 
governments, and which alone make any govern- 
ment possible. It would be justified by the instinct 
of self-preservation, which belongs to governments 
as it belongs to individuals, and which is in itself a 
higher necessity than the literal observance of any 
conventional article of agreement, and which is to 
be understood even if it is not expressly mentioned. 
But then what good can a civil war accomplish 
unless there are distinct and well-understood ideas 
in regard to the object which is to be gained by it, 
and unless it is demanded by the patriotic senti- 
ment and the moral convictions of the people that 
those ideas shall be carried out ? In that case we 
should engage in it without an object, — with many 
misgivings, — without those high convictions which 
alone can nerve the heart of a people to meet the 
dangers of war and to bear up under its necessary 
inconveniences and burdens, and its possible disas- 
ters and calamities. War is the last dread resort 
of nations. No man has a right to declare for it 



THE WAR 181 

unless he is willing himself to share its burdens 
and its dangers. No man, I say, has a right to 
vote for war unless he is so convinced of its neces- 
sity that he would feel justified before God in offer- 
ing himself or his sons to assume the awful respon- 
sibility of taking the lives of others or sacrificing 
their own lives. Until a community feel that such 
is the necessity of war, they have no right to enter 
upon it. 

" The nation that declares war without this con- 
viction of its political or moral necessity — the 
citizen who votes for war, or who knowingly and 
intentionally stirs up the passions of others in order 
to cause a war, without this conviction of its neces- 
sity — is guilty of murder, with all its attendant 
atrocities and crimes. 

" I can conceive of circumstances arising to-day 

— in some localities, at this very moment, circum- 
stances may exist — which justify such a recourse 
to arms. If a national vessel or a national fort 
is attacked, it must of course repel the attack, if it 
has the ability, or we no longer have any govern- 
ment, and the horrors of universal anarchy — a 
thousand times worse than the horrors of civil war 

— are upon us and there is no hope left. Such 
a collision is not to be lightly provoked. But if it 
should be forced upon us, the whole patriotic heart 
of the country should be ready to meet it. 

" Still, even if driven into war by such an ex- 
tremity, and still more if, as I trust will be the 
case, there should be no war, the only hope of our 
political and national salvation must be : — 



182 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

" 1. In a higher sentiment of patriotism. We 
have been so prosperous that we have had little to 
call out our national feeling. Like a family living 
on in unbroken prosperity and health, we know 
not how strong our interest in one another is. Our 
Revolutionary War united us. Our second war 
with England did much in many parts of the 
country to call out the sentiments of national pride 
and honor. Even the war with Mexico did some- 
thing in this way, though it was mostly of a sec- 
tional character. 

" It would have been a blessing to us if this 
same outrageous act of foreign aggression only 
could have been involved in a fearful contest 
with the most powerful nations in the world. It 
would have cemented us together as a people, and 
made us forget our private quarrels. But we have 
been prosperous beyond all former example among 
nations. We are young. We have not, as most 
nations have, a common history of centuries, to 
awaken a national enthusiasm and bind us together 
by the affecting memories of many generations. 
We are made up of foreign ingredients, and have 
not yet had time to be assimilated into one homo- 
geneous nationality. 

" These unfavorable influences we must seek to 
overcome. We must have a higher sense of na- 
tional honor, and of the devotion and love which 
we owe to our country, the common mother of us 
all. We must be ready to make sacrifices. We 
must cherish the sentiment of reverence for her 
and her institutions. We must look up to the 



THE WAR 183 

, flag which she holds over us with feelings second 
only to those with which we love and worship the 
Almighty. We must be ready to do what we can 
ourselves, and pray God in his infinite mercy and 
power to do what we cannot do, to preserve and 
defend our native land. 

. " If our present perils only help to call out this 

, sentiment, to make us feel how much we owe to 

the mild and benignant government under which 

we have been born, and how much we should be 

ready to sacrifice in its behalf, they will accom- 

. plish a great and a good work. 

" But in order that patriotism may lead to good 
results in a country like ours, it must be enlight- 
ened by just and Christian ideas of government. 
Our fathers studied the subject. They had wise 
and consistent theoi'ies. How is it now ? How is 
it with our young men ? How is it even with those 
I who are to exercise a leading influence in the com- 
munity ? 

" These things should be looked into. Then 
there will be light, and with it higher ideas as well 
as a warmer sentiment of public duty. 

" But, after all, the seat of our disease lies deeper 
than this. We want : — 

" 2. Higher views of life — a higher standard of 
moral and religious rectitude everywhere to act 
|upon the hearts of our people. The Roman his- 
torian in the latter days of the republic looked 
upon it as one of the sure signs of impending ruin, 
that all things had become venal. Eveiy thing, 
even patriotism and personal honor, had its price. 



184 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

Money was the god to which everything was ready 
to bow. Have not we been making mournful pro- 
gress in this direction ? A national prosperity 
such as no people ever knew before has been over- 
whelming us and displacing not only the frugal 
habits and temperate ideas of our people in regard 
to these things, but lowering the whole ideal of 
life and subordinating it more and more to the 
demands of a vulgar ambition for wealth. 

" Here is the great sin and peril of our day. This, i 
more than seceding States, is undermining our high- 
est prosperity and degrading our national charac- 
ter. This empire of money-making — the love of 
it the ruling passion — is what has closed the eyes 
of our Southern brethren to the evils and enormi- 
ties of their social system, and driven them into 
their present desperate measures. This it is — the 
craving for positions which yield money — that 
has lowered the tone of our politics and made the 
whole sphere of party welfare, to such an extent, 
one vast system of moral corruption. It is this 
that enters our places of business and exalts the 
law of pecuniary expediency above the law of 
moral rectitude. It is this that enters the poor 
man's house and fills it with heart-burnings and jea- 
lousies against his more prosperous neighbors, and 
instills into his children's minds an ambition to be 
rich, which crushes out their finer sentiments and 
makes them ready to sacrifice everything else to I 
that one end. And so with that one ignoble idea 
they are struggling up in life, and, while many 
fail and fall, one in five hundred perhaps succeeds 



THE WAR 185 

at last in gaining his end, and in being, not a man 
of high and generous aims which make himself and 
his wealth a humanizing, Christianizing influence 
and blessing in society, but in being a vulgar, low- 
minded, selfish, rich man. 

" I know that there are better things among us. 
I know that this mean ambition for wealth, without 
the attendant graces which alone can make wealth 
honorable, is not the universal or even the common 
passion among us. If it were so, our case would 
indeed be hopeless. For a society based solely on 
a material prosperity, without the higher instincts 
and sentiments to bear it up, is a fabric built in 
the slime of a bottomless bog, which sooner or 
later must swallow it up. We still have such a 
thing as mercantile honor ; a generous regard for 
the wants of the suffering ; domestic purity, a pro- 
lific source of all the virtues ; family ties formed 
and cherished without regard to mercenary consid- 
erations. We have pure names among us yet, 
bright examples in public and private life, among 
the rich and the poor, and especially in the great 
middle classes which constitute the moral as well 
as the physical strength and hope of the nation. 
We must never forget these encouraging symp- 
toms and omens of good. 

" Still, in the growing habits of luxurious and 
extravagant living, and the disposition to estimate 
everything by the money it will bring in the mar- 
ket, there is a tendency downward, which is felt 
especially in everything connected with our public 
affairs. If this tendency is allowed to go on un- 



186 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

checked, it is not difficult to see what must be the 
end. Let us deplore it with tears and penitence. 
Let us labor to resist and turn it back. 

" But what can we do in regard to a matter of 
such momentous importance ? What are we that 
we should have any influence on the condition ofti 
this great nation and the administration of its 
government ? Each one of us can act on one citi- 
zen ; reform one if he is now wrong ; bring one un- 
der the law of God ; make one patriot with clear 
ideas of public duty, with a high ideal of life and 
with earnest efforts to bring his life into harmoni- 
ous relations with its ideal. 

" We can each one of us do this in our own case. 
and thus each one of us will be a centre of health- 
ful and beneficent influence. Our better thoughts 
and motives will act on those around us. The 
public spirit which animates us will infuse itseli 
into our children. Instead of steeping their young 
natures in sordid and selfish sentiments, we shal. 
animate and stimulate them with purer ideas oi 
private honor and public duty. They will breatlw 
a more bracing atmosphere. The spirit will b( 
contagious. The neighborhood in which each on< 
of us lives will catch our tone of feeling, and carrj 
it on till the impulses which have gone forth fron 
these separate centres touch one another and th< 
whole community feels a new and quickening 
power. If we in this town will only do this, i: 
others like us will do the same in neighboring 
towns, the whole country, the whole State, and a 
length the whole nation, will be redeemed anc 



THE WAR 187 

Baved. It is in our own private parity, and the 

virtues which enrich and adorn our homes and our 

little communities, that we are to seek for that 

: which alone can secure our public safety and ad- 

i vance our national honor. The change which is 

: to regenerate the nation must begin in our own 

i hearts. The crown indeed is fallen from our head ; 

woe unto us that we have sinned. Turn thou us 

unto thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned ; renew 

■ our days as of old." 

Three weeks later, when the first gun had been 
fired and the contest had begun, he wrote : — 

" The mighty impulse that sways this people, 
and makes men of every class and condition in so- 
i ciety ready to be offered on the altar of their coun- 
try, is an earnest of a better order of things. What 
we have been taught by our grandparents to re- 
! gard as one of the most sublime movements in his- 
; tory is showing itself as a present fact in the 
midst of us. The spirit of '76 is revived. Rich 
men are giving their money. Fathers, too old to 
go themselves, are sending their young men into 
the face of extreme and imminent peril. Mothers, 
and sisters, and wives bestow on them their bless- 
ing, but do not ask them to stay. ' Go,' they say, 
'and God be with you.' These young men who 
have gone from among us, and with whom the 
deadly work has already begun, are not the vic- 
tims of a misguided enthusiasm or a momentary 
caprice. As we have looked into their counte- 
nances, we have been able to see no mark of levity 



188 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

or of intemperate excitement, but symptoms of a 
profound sensibility, and of a fixed and solemn 
purpose. Character ripens fast under the pressure 
of these great dramatic and historic events. Years 
of life are crowded into days. The boy of yester- 
day has ripened into the man of to-day. The strip- 
ling looks into the face of one dearer to him than 
life, and then, with stifling and perhaps speechless 
emotions, without one wavering thought, goes, a 
matured and thoughtful man, to search out and 
confront the danger whose shadow is round us all, 
and even here darkening the very sunlight, as with 
some strange apprehension of alarm. It is through 
sacrifices like these, and through men like these, , 
that every country worth living in has purchased 
and maintained its inheritance of civil and religious 
freedom. 

" Is it said that our religion is one of peace ? 
So it is, and we would bow in reverence before the 
great Prince of peace ; but we must remember 
that even he came not to send peace into the 
world, but a sword. In the mysterious counsels of I 
Almighty wisdom the highest and holiest ends of 
civil society are to be wrought out in deadly con- 
flict, and with such weapons as human hands can 
wield. And through these conflicts and wars, in 
all ages of the world, the noblest exemplars of 
Christian character have been formed, and nowhere 
have more earnest and holy supplications to Al- 
mighty God been raised than on the eve of 
battle." ! 

1 Christian Register, April 27, 1861. 



THE WAR 189 

The second sermon was delivered three years 
later, when the great contest was at the full height 
of its terrible earnestness. For many years Mr. 
John Keed was sexton of the Milton church. He 
had a son, James Sewall Reed, who went to Cali- 
fornia at the age of seventeen, one of the Argo- 
nauts of 1849. The boy developed into a man in 
the rough life of early days in California. In 1862 
a company of men was enlisted in California, who 
came East together, and became Company A of 
the Second Massachusetts Cavalry ; James Sewall 
Reed came with them as the captain of " the Cali- 
fornia Hundred." On the anniversary of Wash- 
ington's birthday, the 22d of February, 1864, while 
acting as major in command of a battalion, Captain 
Reed was killed near Drainsville, Va. On the 13th 
of March, 1864, Dr. Morison preached the follow- 
ing sermon in the Milton church : — 

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his 
life for his friends. — John xv. 13. 

" These words were spoken by our Saviour the 
evening before his crucifixion, and refer to his own 
death, — that great event which, in connection 
with his teachings and his acts, has wrought such 
a change in the moral convictions, the spiritual 
insight, and the religious life of the world. The 
whole plane of our being has been lifted up and 
enlarged by the sentiment here expressed, illus- 
trated, and confirmed, as it was so speedily by his 



190 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

death, and his resurrection from the dead. The 
end for which we are born has thus been projected 
into higher realms. This world has been enriched 
and glorified by the light which streams upon it i 
from the world of spiritual life and joy in which 
he lives, and which he has brought into more evi- 
dent and vital relations with us. Because he lives, 
we shall live also. As we live and believe in him, 
we are made partakers of his life, and already be- 
come members of that kingdom which rises over 
us, which enfolds us in its embrace, and carries up i 
into its wide and holy realm the souls of his fol- 
lowers, and the work which seems unfinished and I 
in vain because of their premature departure from 
the earth. 

" Here is one of the decisive tests of discipleship 
indicated by Jesus. He who so lives amid the 
higher sentiments and affections of our religion as 
to subordinate everything else to them is recognized 
as belonging to him. Thus it is that he who loses 
his life for his sake shall find it. That is, he who, 
at the command of higher obligations, disregards 
this visible, apparent, earthly life, enters into the 
unseen, substantial, eternal life, and, so far, is lifted 
up into his wider sphere of pure, unselfish living. 

" Here is a real ground of distinction between 
those who are followers of Christ and those who 
are not. If you find a man to whom property or 
life is more sacred than duty, you may be sure that 
he has not entered into the spirit of Jesus. If you 
meet a man who scoffs at the finer sentiments of 
our nature, and, in respect to the greatest sacrifices 



THE WAR 191 

which are made to them, asks, ' Why all this 
waste ? ' you may be sure that he is unable to know 
anything of the ideas which Jesus came to declare, 
or the life which he came to impart. Here, more 
than in any ecclesiastical or theological opinions or 
professions, is the best test of our allegiance to 
Christ. He who resists temptation to wrong-doing, 
and in his life keeps himself unspotted from the 
world ; he who preserves the sweetness of his affec- 
tions, and, delighting to do what he can for the 
comfort and happiness of others, forgets himself in 
his devotion to them ; he who esteems the cause of 
righteousness more sacred than that of self-interest, 
who considers the integrity and life of his country 
as of more importance than any private end, and 
who, so believing, gives his life in attestation of his 
belief, — he so far enters into the spirit of our 
Lord, and approves himself his follower and dis- 
ciple. 

" ' Greater love hath no man than this, that a 
man lay down his life for his friends.' He who 
spoke these words died in order that the world 
might be drawn towards him, and, through faith in 
him, be made partakers of his divine and eternal 
life. His immediate followers, with no country 
except the spiritual community in which they were 
united, were called often to attest their fidelity to 
him by dying as witnesses to his truth ; and the 
more they died, the more their numbers multiplied 
and their cause prevailed. When prosperity and 
ease and life became dearer to them than their 
faith in Christ and their fidelity to him, then their 



192 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

cause languished and their religion became inoper- 
ative and dead. 

"Those times of martyrdom, in the forms in 
which it then existed, have passed away. But 
there are other trials which furnish the same test 
of character, and in which our fidelity, even unto 
death, is as essential to the rectitude of our own 
lives and the advancement of God's kingdom on 
the earth. 

" The highest conception we can form of a Chris- 
tian commonwealth is that of a great spiritual com- 
munity, the unseen Church of Christ, in which his 
ransomed ones of all ages and lands are gathered 
together, and which, in one unbroken communion, 
reaches down from heaven to earth, and draws 
into its embrace, from every kindred and nation 
and tongue, those who fear God and work right- 
eousness. 

"This is the highest idea that we can form of 
a Christian commonwealth. Next to this, and, in 
its highest state, beyond anything that the world 
has yet known, coincident with it, is the idea of 
a Christian people united together in one great 
commonwealth ; protected by wise and equal laws ; 
owing allegiance to the same government ; looking 
to the national flag as the emblem of liberty and 
justice, of union and strength, the ensign of a 
nation ready to put forth all its energies to defend 
the rights of the weakest citizen against the most 
powerful empire on the earth ; guarding all its 
children with equal care ; opening its schools to 
rich and poor alike ; protecting churches and hos- 






THE WAR 193 

pitals, and all benign institutions and charities ; 
raising highways through the wilderness for the 
houseless ; preparing homesteads for the homeless ; 
and, like the great Benefactor of our race, sending 
out its gracious invitations into distant lands, and 
inviting people of every rank and condition, but 
especially the poor, the down-trodden, and the 
oppressed, to come, without money and without 
price, to share with us the privileges that we and 
our children enjoy. Next to the idea of the uni- 
versal Church of Christ, reaching from earth to 
: heaven through all ages and all lands, is this idea 
I of a Christian commonwealth reaching from ocean 
; to ocean, — from the lakes and forests of the North 
i almost to the tropics ; administering its laws with 
( an authority so gentle that we were hardly con- 
I scions of its pressure ; while its benefactions visited 
us like the dews and the providence of God, — so 
silently, that we forgot to be thankful for them. 
No such commonwealth as this of ours ever before 
i existed, — no one so free, and yet so secure; so 
I little interfering with individual rights, and yet so 
: universally extending its protection and its gifts to 
all. We began our life as a people here in the 
wilderness. We grew up by the neglect of the 
nation which had authority over us. Our institu- 
tions, our government, and our laws were left to 
form themselves around us, like our bodies, by no 
arbitrary rules, but almost as a natural growth 
from the vital forces which were at work within. 
The old governments and nations of the earth, 
which at first despised or ignored us, at length 



194 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

began to look upon us with admiration and fear. 
We were rapidly preparing, in the regular progress 
of our advancement, to take our place as the fore- 
most among them all ; and, except for one cruel 
injustice, allowed by our government, and binding 
its chains on four millions of helpless people, its 
influence was more and more felt throughout the 
world in favor of freedom and justice, and against 
the old despotisms which had so long oppressed the 
hearts and hopes of men. This, my friends, was 
the commonwealth in which we were born, under 
whose laws, and in whose institutions, we were 
nurtured. Lived there ever a people on the face 
of the earth who had so much reason to honor and 
reverence and sustain the government which threw 
its protecting arms and laws around them ; whose 
blessings were so many, and its burdens so light? 
If foreign nations had leagued themselves together 
to overthrow and destroy it, should we not have 
esteemed it a privilege and a joy to lay down our 
lives in its defense? If traitors at home should 
league themselves together, and, after secretly plot- 
ting against it for more than a quarter of a century, 
should aim their murderous weapons at the bosom 
from which their life and ours alike was drawn, 
though they were a thousand times our brethren, 
could we stand by and see them murder the com- 
mon mother of us all ? ' Greater love hath no 
man than this, that he lay down his life for his 
friends.' And here traitors, with murderous hands 
and thoughts, are trying to cut in pieces and de- 
stroy the dear and venerated form of her who, as 



THE WAR 195 

our common mother, has pressed us all to her 
bosom, and who, with bleeding countenance and an 
expression of infinite sorrow, looks imploringly to 
us for our support. By all that is most sacred in 
life, by our reverence for Christ and the righteous 
laws which he would have us obey, by what we owe 
to our children's children, she calls upon us to save 
her from this act of treachery and murder ; to save 
our national honor and life ; to uphold through her 
the supremacy of wise and equal laws ; to leave 
her with added purity, so as to awaken a deeper 
love and reverence among those who shall come 
after us. Shall we not obey her call, and lay down 
our lives if need be, freely, in defense of her, who, 
next to our Saviour, is our greatest benefactor and 
friend ? 

" This is the appeal which ' our own, our native 
land,' has been making to her children for the last 
three years. And not in vain. No call of a suf- 
fering parent was ever more bravely or more faith- 
fully and reverently obeyed. From every walk of 
life, and from every post of duty, her sons have 
come forth, and thus we have been enabled to 
j see, as never before, what specimens of large and 
generous manhood had grown up under her care. 
From our common schools and our colleges, from 
poor men's homes and rich men's homes, young 
men, moved by a common enthusiasm, have gone 
forth, side by side, to confront a common danger, 
and to preserve the integrity and life of the nation. 
Examples have been given of a heroism as beauti- 
ful, of a gentleness as winning, of a generosity as 



196 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

noble, of a fidelity as sacred, and a reliance on 
God as devout and unfaltering, as any that are to 
be found in the pages of history or of poetry. I 
cannot think of them, whether living or dead, other- 
wise than with gratitude and honor. Their names 
will be kept among vis as watchwords to kindle the 
patriotism of the young in all coming generations, 
and to keep alive their reverence for ' whatsoever 
things are honest, whatsoever things are lovely and 
of good report.' While they live, let our prayers 
call down the protection and benediction of Heaven 
upon them, and, when they die, let their names 
and memory be cherished as the dearest and most 
sacred of our treasures. 

" I wish to speak this morning of two men, in 
widely different spheres of activity, equally devoted 
to the same cause, and equally, I think, laying 
down their lives for their country within the last 
few weeks. One of them was born and passed his 
early years within the sight of this church. This 
quiet scene of rural loveliness surrounding the 
home of his childhood ; these trees, standing here 
as God's sentinels to protect and guard his house 
of worship ; these roads and fields ; this house of 
prayer, and the Sunday-school connected with it, 
— all, doubtless, had their influence in forming his 
character and preparing him for the responsible 
duties that were to be laid upon him. He was 
thirteen years old when I came here in January, 
1846. Once in that winter, by reason of a most 
violent storm, I preached to an audience of five 
persons, and he was one of the five. He had no 






THE WAR 197 

advantages of education which any boy among us 
may not have. He went to the town school, and 
then, for a short time, was a student in the acad- 
emy under the instruction of Mr. Ezra Ripley, — 
a man of high purposes, of rare purity, integrity, 
and modesty, who, at the commencement of this 
war, left an extensive and increasing practice at 
the bar, and carried with him into the military 
service the brave and persistent resolution, the 
keen sense of right, and the instinctive hatred of 
wrong, for which he had been distinguished in civil 
life. After more than two years of faithful and 
efficient service, he died near Vicksburg, Miss., a 
few weeks after the capture of that city. The 
lability with which he acted, and the value of the 
(services which he rendered, were very inadequately 
(represented by the position which he held as lieu- 
; tenant in the Twenty -ninth Regiment of Massachu- 
setts Volunteers. 

i " At the age of seventeen, James Sew all Reed 
went to California, where, beginning as a day- 
laborer in some mechanical employment, he worked 
•his way up to a post of responsibility and trust in 
a large mercantile house, whose confidence and re- 
spect he always afterwards retained. Few among 
us know the temptations to which our young men 
were then exposed in that distant land, freed as 
they were from all the restraints of home, and from 
the legal and moral safeguards which are furnished 
by the laws and habits of a well-ordered commu- 
nity. It is the testimony of those who knew him 
best through his whole experience there that he 



198 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

never took advantage of the disordered state of 
society to relax the severity of his principles or to 
give up anything of his moral purity and ingenu- 1 
ousness. At the age of twenty-two, he was the < 
captain of a military company, and exercised a : 
great and salutary influence over his men. He i 
spent one season in Lower California, and the i 
next on Frazer's River, where he was brought into < 
contact with the Indians, whose admiration and i 
confidence he gained by his remarkable courage 
and his honesty, and whose grateful and devoted ,; 
services he secured by his generosity and kind- 1 
ness. 

" At length there came a time when the govern- 
ment of California had become so corrupt that the 
laws were perverted, and courts of justice turned 
into instruments of violence and wrong by those 
whose business it was to administer them. Nei- 
ther life nor property was respected, and some of the 
best citizens, who had made themselves obnoxious 
to wicked and lawless rulers, were shot dead, either 
in the streets or at their places of business. The 
courts of justice offered no redress, but sheltered ' 
the murderers from harm. It was one of those 
rare and fearful occasions which are not likely ever 
to occur in a settled community, under our popular 
form of government, when the people are justified 
in taking the law into their own hands, and secur- 
ing the ends of justice by a summary and illegal 
process. Here our friend, as a military officer, 
by his judgment, his perfect fearlessness, and the 
ascendency which he had over his men, rendered 



THE WAR 199 

important services to the cause of good government, 
and secured for himself, on a larger scale than be- 
fore, a name and a place in the community, as one 
who might be relied upon in any great and perilous 
emergency. 

" When the Civil War broke out, he wished to 
offer himself as a volunteer. But the loyalty of 
California was at that time so doubtful, and the 
ties which bound her to the Union were so new 
i and untried, that it seemed as if loyal citizens were 
more needed, and might be more useful to the gov- 
ernment, there than here. But he got out his mili- 
tary books and studied them with continuous and 
earnest attention ; and when the fervor of our first 
enthusiasm here in the East had abated, and it was 
beginning to be difficult to get the men that were 
needed, he, with a friend, 1 who like himself has 
been in some measure connected with this religious 
society, determined to raise a company of cavalry. 
Within less than a week, five hundred men offered 
themselves as volunteers. But they could get per- 
mission to enlist only one hundred. With these 
picked men he came on from California about fif- 
teen months ago, and attached himself to the Sec- 
ond Regiment of Massachusetts Cavalry. The 
expectations which he and they inspired have not 
been disappointed. He had, in a remarkable de- 
; gree, the qualities which endear an officer to his 
men, and command at once their confidence and 
their obedience. He has had a trying service, 
and has always been found equal to its require- 

1 Captain Archibald M'Kendry. 



200 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

merits. He might have escaped its hardships. On 
those distant shores of the Pacific, he might have 
remained at home without any imputation upon his 
patriotism or his honor. He was a man of warm i 
domestic affections. He loved his home, with its ; 
comforts and its endearments. But the voice of 
his country, stabbed, and threatened with destruc- 
tion, by the treachery and violence of her own 
sons, calling on him to give his services and his | 
life in her defense, was a voice that he could not : 
resist. He has fallen in the ripeness of his early 
manhood. No stain rests on the fair fame which 
he has bravely and honorably won. The more 
closely and confidentially I have inquired into his 
private history from those who knew him best and 
in his most secret walks, the more unhesitating and 
unequivocal has been the testimony to the purity 
and the integrity of his life. No braver man 
lived, and he was as gentle as he was brave. A 
lady who came from California with him, and 
whose sympathies were strongly with the South, 
said she knew he was a brave man, because he was 
so gentle, so devoted, and so patient in his atten- 
tions to a little, helpless child. And so it usually 
is. The finest qualities of gentleness and mod- 
esty, of love and reverence, are those which entwine 
themselves most closely and tenderly around the 
strongest. In the field or the camp, when others 
were tired out or discouraged, he was always cheer- 
ful, and dispelled their despondency by the conta- 
gion of his own light-hearted and mirthful spirit. 
Letters from the camp say that it is dull and sad 



THE WAR 201 

there now, without him. But he has fallen in the 
performance of a great and solemn duty. He 
pledged himself to a sacred cause, and he has ful- 
filled his pledge. These trees and hills will be 
clothed with a fresher green ; these homes will be 
more secure and better worth living in ; these 
schools will be filled with a freer and more docile 
succession of pupils ; these churches will be conse- 
crated by a holier worship, a purer morality, and a 
loftier faith ; a nobler race will walk our streets for 
generations yet to come, when we are dead and long 
centuries hence, — because of the life which he and 
others like him have lived, and the death which they 
have died. If any of you should stand weeping by 
what seems to you their untimely graves, remember 
the words inscribed on the tomb at Thermopylae, 
— ' Go tell them at Lacedaemon that we lie here 
in obedience to her laws.' Or, better than that, 
with more of the Christian spirit in which so many 
of our young men have entered this great and ter- 
rible conflict, write upon their tombs, or at least 
associate with their memory, the words, forever 
consecrated as the words of Jesus, and sanctified to 
us by his death : ' Greater love hath no man than 
this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.' 

" The day after our friend, with many tears and 
blessings, was laid in his grave, the news came from 
San Francisco that his minister, the Rev. Thomas 
Starr King, had suddenly died that morning. 
There was but one man in the United States who 
had greater power than he to draw together vast 
assemblies of men, enchain them by his generous 



202 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

thoughts, and charge them with his own enthusiasm. 
When this wicked war was forced upon us by the 
assault on Fort Sumter, and it was doubtful which! 
side the new State on the Pacific might join, Mr. i 
King gave himself to his country with a purpose 
as brave and as solemn as if he had thrown hini-i 
self upon the most desperate battle-field. He tra-i 
versed the State. Pie lectured, he preached, he 
prayed. He electrified great masses of men with! 
his own self -forgetting patriotism. He caused the 
sentiment of national honor and enthusiasm to* 
thrill through them, and bind them to their coun- 1 
try with a warm and unfaltering devotion. There 
was in him no jealousy, no narrow thought of self, ' 
to dim the clearness of his eye ; no ugly ambition i 
to gnaw at his heart-strings, and interfere with his 
kindly judgments, or prompt to ill-natured and un- 
generous remarks upon the character and motives 
of others. An intimate friend of his, who preached 
about him last Sunday, with singular felicity of 
adaptation entitled his sermon ' The Unspotted 
Life.' He had what no bad man ever has, — a laugh 
which rung as clear and mirthful as the tones of a 
Christmas bell. WJien he went from us, he bore 
with him the light-heartedness, the elasticity, and 
the joyousness of a boy. But I learn that one who 
saw him a short time ago said that he looked then > 
like an old man. The labors and the responsi- 
bilities of a lifetime, crowded with such intensity 
into those few brief months, had told upon him as J 
the work of years, and probably left him without 
strength to bear up under a disease which other- 



THE WAR 203 

wise might have had no fatal power over him. I 
have little doubt that, like hundreds of other loyal 
men at their various posts of duty in civil life, he 
died ' a blessed martyr ' to his country as truly 
as if he had been slain upon the battle-field. 

" The last Sunday that Captain Reed and his 
• California Hundred ' spent in San Francisco, they 
attended Mr. King's church. His concluding words, 
which I read from a copy written in his own clear 
hand as a parting memorial to his friend Captain 
Reed, were these : ' God bless you, brother Amer- 
icans, for your readiness, for your zeal, for your 
pure offering of devotedness, which to-day add 
1 force as well as illustration to the pleadings of the 
1 gospel with our hearts ! You are not " weary " of 
the call and the strain of patriotism. There are 
those at the East who are. They wear no wounds 
' or scars. They have not exposed their lives. . . . 
1 And you, in these same hours, seek the opportu- 
'■ nity of pledging strength and skill, and blood 
and breath, to our country's integrity and honor. 
| Heaven hear our prayers for you, and cover you 
with its benediction ! . . . May the flash of your 
blades, if you are called into battle, be the dawn of 
' a better age for your country ! . . . Go, brethren ; 
do your tremendous duty with dedicated hearts, in 
the fear of God, which roots out all other fear ; in 
allegiance to Christ ; with the New Testament very 
near your hand, and its appeals very sweet to your 
1 souls! " Be not weary with well-doing," though your 
' marches be long and your hope of speedy success 
denied. In due time you shall reap if you faint 



204 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

not ; and, if those you leave at home be not cow> 
ards and traitors both, you shall reap though you 
bleed, though you be maimed, though you die a 
you shall reap in your country's redemption and 
renewal, in the honor that will invest your names: 
in future years, in your reward in the better world.! 
" These, my friends, are great words of exhorta-: 
tion and of promise. And shall they not be full 
filled? Both he who spoke them, and the leader 
of those to whom they were spoken, have laid down 
their lives in attestation of their truth, and have 
entered into their reward. It remains for us who 
yet live to follow them by consecrating ourselves 
anew to the cause for which they died, and by car 
rying on, in whatever sphere of activity we can 
the work which they have left unfinished. It was: 
well that our friend who died in battle for us 
should be buried with every demonstration of love 
and honor, and that his name should be held ii 
everlasting remembrance by those who wish well t( 
their country ; and when our brother on the shon 
of a distant ocean, amid peaceful pursuits, fel 
almost as suddenly at his post of duty, it was welj 
that places of business should be closed and flags; 
at half-mast, and a whole community sorrowing as 
under a great and common bereavement in th< 
home of his adoption, and that here words of ten 
der and reverent commemoration should be uttered 
But we shall praise them best, we shall most trulj 
honor their name and their memory, when we do 
as they have done, and in thought and word, hi 
heart and deed, give ourselves to the work for whicl 



THE WAR 205 

they lived and died. To us, as to them, our Sa- 
viour's words apply, — ' Greater love hath no man 
than this, that a man lay down his life for his 
friends.' " 



VIII 

LAST YEAKS IN MILTON 






On Thursday, March 2, 1871, Mr. Francis 1 
Washburn was ordained as associate pastor in th 
Milton church. Twenty-five years of close paste! 
ral relations had made the will of the pastor am 
of the parish one, and Dr. Morison selected his owi 
colleague. At the ordination, the senior pasto 
gave the address to the people, which, spoken by :; 
minister to the people of his own parish, was neces 
sarily based on his own experience, and is repro 
duced here : — 

" With fitting and affecting services we have se - 
apart this young man as a minister of the Gospe 
of Christ to this ancient church and parish. Wt, 
would welcome him to this sacred charge. We 
would also welcome him to this community as one 
who, in choosing his calling, has shown his desire 
to give his mind and heart and life to advance, 
not his own personal ends, but the highest interests 
of society. We would receive him into our homes 
as a friend whom we shall be glad to see always, 
and especially in the great epochs and emergencies 
of life. We receive him among us in the hope 
and assurance that he will grow into the heart of 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 207 

this community, and become every year more and 
more an influence for good to us all. We receive 
him as a man of culture and refinement, who may 
help to create around us a finer social atmosphere. 
We receive him as a scholar, whose intelligence 
may make itself felt not only in our schools, but 
everywhere, and especially with the young, in quick- 
ening their love of intellectual improvement, and 
their desire for the advantages of a higher educa- 
tion. We welcome him as a citizen, who, by his en- 
larged ideas growing constantly more enlightened, 
by his thoughtful and Christian acts, and by his 
daily walk in the midst of this people, may, with a 
gradually increasing power, join himself to all other 
helpful agencies in lifting us up into a grander and 
richer civilization. 

" In all these ways his interests are your interests. 
His success is to be your success. His failure will 
be a loss and a failure to every one of us. He is 
your agent, doing your work, and in looking to you 
for aid, and asking you to assist him by your time, 
your counsel, or your money, he will not be asking 
a favor for himself, but asking you to help on your 
own work by helping him to do it more effectually. 
It is not the lack of personal kindness that dis- 
appoints and disheartens ministers. I have often 
been oppressed and humbled by personal favors 
which have only made me feel how little I was 
doing to merit them. That which we need and 
long for most of all is to have earnest men and 
women to act with us in whatever may promote the 
Christian well-being of a parish, — willing laborers 



208 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

in the church and in the Sunday-school, to make 
the offices of our religion alive and beautiful. 
Here is what we need most of all, — not yours, 
but you ; and the want of this is what depresses 
and discourages many a young man who has gone 
into his profession with all the enthusiasm of his 
nature. 

" If the truths, the duties, the motives which 
your minister holds up to you are anything, they 
are the most momentous themes which can be pre- 
sented to human beings. There is nothing serious 
in mortality compared with them. Do not, then, 
allow any light considerations to push aside his 
claims to a hearing, and to show him, by actions 
stronger than words, how lightly you esteem his 
ministrations. I speak not of the chill which is 
thus sent into his heart, but of its influence on you. 
Amid the rush and cares of life, we all of us need 
to be reminded of higher concerns. We need to 
be instructed in them. We need to be persuaded 
to take them into our hearts, that they may enrich 
and ennoble us by their sublime hopes, and make 
life a more gracious and holy thing to us. In 
inviting here a man of intelligence, improved by a 
generous and varied culture, with solemn religious 
purposes, that he may employ his time and strength 
in leading us upward into a higher and nobler life, 
we pledge ourselves to give him an opportunity to 
do his work. We need his help and he needs ours, 
— our personal attention, our counsel, our kindly 
interest, not so much in him as in his work. 

" While we receive him into our homes and our 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 209 

confidence, that he may sympathize with us and 
we with him in common matters, let us also appre- 
ciate his highest labors and aspirations. When 
he strives to hold up to himself and us a grander 
ideal of what human beings should do and be in 
their relations to God and to one another, let us 
not push his appeal aside by saying, even silently 
to ourselves, that this is only a young man's dream. 
The young man's dream of to-day is the foreshadow- 
ing of what his life and his character are to be 
hereafter. The young man's visions in this genera- 
tion are to be in their fulfillment the glory of the 
age that shall succeed. I have lived long enough 
to see ideas, which were denounced by our most 
prudent and commanding intellects as the imprac- 
ticable dreams of youth, hailed as the salvation of 
our country in its darkest hours, and made a part 
of the organic law of the land. Woe to the people 
whose young men see no visions of ideal realms, 
greatness, and beauty to draw them upward into 
higher thought and life ! The young man's most 
daring hopes and visions in this world should be 
an augury and foreshadowing of the great and joy- 
ful realities which may appeal to our highest facul- 
ties here, and meet us in a grander experience 
hereafter. There is an inspiration of the heart 
which in its sublime anticipations goes beyond all 
the teachings of our worldly prudence. Let us 
listen, then, with respect, I w r ould almost say with 
reverence, to a young man of pure life and sober 
thought who is giving himself to the highest con- 
cerns of our being. Let us be slow to condemn, as 



210 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

dreams of what is unattainable, the views and aspi- 
rations by which he would turn us towards a better 
life and a holier kingdom, first on earth and then 
in heaven. Let him feel that there are before him 
souls carried upwards with him, as they listen rev- 
erently to the loftiest hopes and thoughts that he 
can utter. Then, in his private meditations and 
studies, he will be encouraged by the assurance 
that the very highest and greatest and best con- 
ceptions that are possible to him are not too high 
or great or good for us. lie will not be tempted 
to lower his standard of Christian effort, and de- 
base his own soul and life by preaching down to 
the comprehension of his people. 

" Many a minister has been starved in his mind 
and his religious affections because his people gave 
no welcome to his best thoughts. A fairer world 
than is lighted up by any earthly sun must shine 
before us. A truer Christian life than we see 
around us here to-day ; visions of a diviner splendor 
descending to earth from heaven, and reflected back 
here from souls consecrated and alive to whatever 
is pure and lovely and divine, — these are the 
images by which the Christian minister is to raise 
himself, and draw you upward, into a broader and 
holier experience. In these things let him have 
your sympathy. Hold him up to the highest capa- 
bilities of his nature, by your generous appreciation 
of the best that he can do. Even if you cannot 
believe so ardently as he does, and though he may 
seem to you a great way off in his visions of ideal 
excellence, still let him feel that you desire and 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 211 

long for this higher kingdom of God, and that you 
are ready with him to spend and be spent in your 
labors to advance its influence among men. In 
our alliance with the great spiritual forces of the 
universe pressing on to this end, all other consider- 
ations vanish away ; and we, ministers and people, 
are left in the Eternal Presence with whatever of 
the diviner love and harmony and beauty we have 
taken up into our life." 

The relation between the two ministers was like 
that of father and son, and of the pleasantest 
character to both. 

Dr. Morison was appointed a lecturer in the 
Divinity School of Harvard University for the 
year 1871-72. He delivered a course of lectures 
on the Pauline Epistles. After his death a minis- 
ter, who was one of his students then, wrote in 
" The Christian Register " of these lectures : — 

"They were certainly among the most valued 
lectures I received there ; and their value, while 
not wanting in the letter, was more prevailingly in 
the spirit. I remember once remarking to a fellow- 
student, ' The lecturer shows the apostle better than 
the lecture.' I doubt if since then I have unfolded 
a text from the Pauline writings, or seriously taken 
thought of the apostle, without the consciousness of 
some side-light suggestion gained in those lecture 
hours, — suggestion not written in the manuscript, 
not spoken, but conveyed. At the close of the 
brief course I was aware that only an introduction 



212 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

to the great career had been given me ; but the 
interior Paul, as I ever since have known him, 
far beyond any thought of the lecturer, had been 
shown me. I have often thought of this expe- 
rience, and sought to explain it ; and all I could 
ever say was that the teacher reflected the apos- 
tle as a less complete moral nature could not have 
done. And in his preaching it was much the 
same. He used to treat of every-day themes with 
e very-day illustrations, with no effort at all to be 
novel or profound or eloquent ; yet his sermons 
were not every-day sermons. Simple and even 
homely, they were suffused with his even-balanced 
faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, 
godliness, brotherly kindness, charity. They were 
ethical. They were spiritual. They corrected, 
cheered, comforted, warmed, vivified. I have 
listened to preachers of stronger presence and 
mightier word, but I have never listened to one 
who gave me a clearer sense of the largeness and 
harmony of divine relations. Moral ultraness or 
one-sidedness was as markedly absent from his ser- 
mon as from himself, and with his faith and love 
and moral grace it was irradiated always." 

In January, 1873, Mr. Washburn was married 
to a lady whom Dr. Morison had long esteemed ; 
they resided temporarily in the house which still 
belongs to and is occupied by the family of Henry 
Ware, Jr., being Dr. Morison's next neighbors. 
The arrangement which had begun so happily and 
auspiciously was not destined to continue. On the 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 213 

29th of December, 1873, Mr. Washburn died ; the 
old man outlived the young man more than twenty 
years. The relations which existed between the 
two ministers are best described in the words of 
Rev. T. J. Munford : — 

" His relations to his senior colleague were so 
cordial and satisfactory that they filled the whole 
neighborhood with the fragrance of affection. 
When we saw them, each seeking not his own but the 
other's welfare, we said to ourselves, ' Behold how 
good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell 
together in unity ! ' This exquisite spectacle has 
done much to remove a great doubt of the modern 
ministry, in which both young and old clergymen 
have so often confessed themselves incapable of 
the generous forbearance and the filial and frater- 
nal love required to prevent rivalry and discord 
between colleagues. In Milton, if nowhere else, 
could be found a young man looking with unfeigned 
satisfaction upon every token of reverence and 
gratitude toward his senior, and an old man stimu- 
lating confidence and hope towards his junior, as 
if his daily life were a cheerful sermon from the 
text, ' He must increase, but I must decrease.' 
The sorrow of few fathers for the death of their 
own sons is deeper than that of Dr. Morison, who 
finds the entire weight of pastoral responsibility 
unexpectedly returning, because of the departure 
of the youthful comrade so worthy of his trust and 
love. 

" While we cannot question the Divine wisdom 



214 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

or love, we confess that it is uncommonly hard to 
be immediately resigned to the loss of one so likely 
to render important services to the world, as well 
as to be the joy of his own home. But his brief 
career was not unblessed. To not a few minds he 
has been a rare minister of beauty, love, and truth, 
showing us an exalted manhood, and drawing us 
nearer to everything divine. We shall seldom hear 
the sweet beatitude, ' Blessed are the pure in heart, 
for they shall see God,' without thinking fondly 
and tenderly of him." 1 

Dr. Morison was again left as sole pastor of the 
Milton church. After a vigorous youth followed 
by an invalid manhood, he had entered upon a 
period of vigorous old age which his friends are 
always glad to think of. In no period of his min- 
istry did he enjoy his work better, or feel more 
capable of his duties, than during this year and a 
half. 

Of the sermons which Dr. Morison prepared 
during this later period, one which was preached 
on eight different occasions, the first being in Mil- 
ton, January 26, 1873, and the last in Peterbor- 
ough, August 1, 1886, is reproduced here : — 

Think not that I ani come to destroy the law or the prophets. 
I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. — Matthew v. 17. 

" What we want most of all is something to dig- 
nify and ennoble our common life. No man is 
1 Christian Register, January 3, 1874. 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 215 

satisfied with the deeds and events of to-day as a 
finality. Not in itself or for itself alone, but as a 
step towards something higher, as the forerunner 
and prophecy of something yet to come, do we 
accept the life of the present hour. However 
pleasant or sad, however easy or hard, our daily 
lot, however extended or circumscribed it may be 
in its immediate relations and effects, we feel all 
the while that something more is needed to fill out 
the purpose of our being, and bring the apparent 
insufficiencies and discords of our daily experience 
into harmony with one another and with our own 
hearts. This can be accomplished only by bringing 
ourselves and our surroundings into living connec- 
tion with something higher than ourselves, l. e. with 
the Infinite mind. Then, by the voluntary surrender 
of ourselves to the supreme Will and Law, we may 
be taken up into the benignant order and harmony 
of the universe. Our imperfections and shortcom- 
ings are supplied from the fullness of Him who is all 
in all. As we enter into the wonderful order and 
harmony of the divine plan, surrendering ourselves 
as willing agents of God in carrying forward his 
vast and beneficent designs, our littleness is lost, 
our insufficiency disappears, we are hid with Christ 
in God, and, becoming ourselves co-workers with 
him, we are made one with him and partakers also 
of what is divine. Each obedient soldier shares in 
the strength of the great army to which he belongs, 
and is animated and guided by the mind of its 
leader. 

" But this train of thought would soon carry us 



216 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

beyond our depth, — into speculations too vast for 
our comprehension. The teachings of Jesus, on 
the other hand, instead of leading us away into a 
vague mysticism, or into speculations beyond our 
reach, come home to our hearts and connect them- 
selves directly with our daily thought and experi- 
ence, and nowhere more than in every part of the 
Sermon on the Mount, where he speaks of having 
come, not to destroy, but to fulfill. 

" The insufficiency of what we now have and are, 
to every one who feels it, may be a prophecy of 
something greater and better ; e. g., I pluck a 
flower from its stalk, admire its beauty for a little 
while, and then, when it begius to wilt, throw it 
away. To me it is only a flower of the field, — one 
among the many thousand wonderful but perishing 
products of nature. Jesus looks upon it, and, see- 
ing what we have seen, fills out our imperfect con- 
ception of it, and makes it at once a medium of 
communication between us and the creative mind 
and love of God ; no longer a lonely, helpless, 
dying thing, blossoming for an hour, standing up 
in its own little momentary life and then perishing 
forever, but a medium through which the creative 
love of God is revealing itself, clothing it with a 
glory and beauty greater than royal magnificence, 
and appealing to us through its unobtrusive and 
unconscious loveliness, that we also should have 
faith in him. 

" Thus everything that falls under the eye of 
Jesus is connected with the mind of God, and the 
laws and workings of his unseen spiritual kingdom. 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 217 

The partial, limited idea which it would otherwise 
, convey is filled out by his recognition of this higher 
and more vital fact. 

" Wonderful indeed was this power in Jesus of 

.filling out, or supplementing, what others saw with 

ithe higher thought which had revealed itself in its 

I fullness only to him. Blessed are they that mourn, 

I for they shall be comforted, because in sorrowing 

\ for what they have lost here they may turn to God 

and find in Him consolation, comfort, an inward 

[peace, a divine joy, which He alone can bestow. 

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain 

jinercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they 

ishall see God. Always the loving, unseen presence 

and kingdom of God come in to fill up the fatal 

.void which would otherwise be found in every soul, 

and in every ideal of human conduct and human 

happiness. 

" We regard with pain the apparent inequalities 
of life. We lament that so few opportunities are 
.given us for great actions. We look with admira- 
tion and almost with envy to men who have had the 
privilege of distinguishing themselves by extraor- 
dinary achievements. We think that, if we only 
could have such opportunities, it would be an im- 
mense advantage to us. If, e. g., we only had it 
in our power to give great sums of money, what 
works of beneficence we would do ! For all who 
cherish such thoughts Jesus would withdraw the 
veil which hides the most important agencies con- 
nected with our lot. And, lo ! we also, not less 
than the greatest general or monarch, have our 



218 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

magnificent opportunities. The poor widow with 
her two mites — it was all the living that she had 
— he who gives but a cup of cold water to one of 
God's little ones in the spirit of Christ — is by the 
righteous judgments of Heaven counted worthy of 
everlasting rewards. We see only the small and 
apparently insignificant act, but He sees it as it is 
in all its surroundings and consequences. He Jills 
out our imperfect idea by showing with what divine 
agencies it is connected, what heavenly powers at- 
tend us in the act, and what heavenly rewards follow 
us when it is accomplished. Thus considered, no 
righteous act is insignificant ; no faithful life is 
obscure ; no struggling of the soul upward is unob- 
served or unaided. We are not alone. The high- 
est laws of the universe are working with us. The 
angels of heaven are watching over us and helping 
us. The heart and the mind of God are for us. 
As our mortal strength fails and our lower desires 
and ambitions disappoint us, and in utter destitution 
and helplessness we turn our thoughts upward and 
ask for mercy and help, the divine compassion is 
never far off or slow to meet us, and the life and 
love of God are, like the air we breathe, always 
ready to flow in and warm and revive our weary 
spirits. 

" He who has revealed to us these holy agencies 
and influences ; who makes the bare places of our 
earthly experience alive with such visions of divine 
love and sympathy and help ; he who thus shows 
how the powers of Heaven wait upon us even here 
in our earthly labors and exposures, and calls on 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 219 

us to lift up our eyes and look upon the fields 
which in the light of these higher disclosures of 
divine truth are white already to harvest, — he 
surely came, not to destroy, but to fulfill, filing 
out as he does the poverty of our thought and our 
lives with such holy and inspiring revelations of 
God's nearness to us and his love. 

" Our mortal senses fence us in and prevent 
our seeing beyond. We allow ourselves to become 
prisoners to this mortal life, which seems to us as 
if it were all the life that we can have any know- 
ledge of. But Jesus Jills out this narrow idea by 
revealing to us the spiritual and eternal life which 
is so closely connected with it. 

"This is the office of Christ to the soul of man. 
Entering so deeply, purging away evei'ything that 
is impure or wrong, and yet so tenderly calling out 
and fostering every true and delicate affection ; 
coming to us with principles so uncompromising 
and severe, reaching into the inmost recesses of 
our being, and yet coming not to destroy but to 
fulfill ; not to break even the bruised reed ; not 
to quench even the smoking flax ; not to destroy 
the smallest virtue which even in its lowest efforts 
gives some indication of the law of Heaven and of 
every great achievement ; not to quench even the 
feeblest hope, which though enveloped in smoke 
and darkness is still a prophecy of good struggling 
upward towards its fulfillment in some better and 
more satisfying experience, — so Christ addresses 
himself to each one of us. Every faculty of our 
nature, by its appropriate exercise in Christian 



220 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

living, he would train, educate, refine, and 
strengthen, till God's purpose in our creation be- 
gins to be fulfilled in us. He lays his consecrating 
hand upon us even in our common labors, and sets 
us apart for the highest end and fulfillment of our 
being. He reaches down into the inward soul of 
man, and, quickening it with his own divine love, 
makes that the controlling power within us, and 
thus exalts and sanctifies our work. 

" Thus, in every direction, the life and thought 
of Jesus would lead us to a truer comprehension 
and fulfillment of the great purposes of life. 

" He reveals to us what is wanting in order to 
restore our disordered natures, and to fill out and 
harmonize our imperfect and discordant faculties. 

" The religion of Jesus comes as a quickening 
power to the soul, awakening, fostering, strength- 
ening, and filling out all our best faculties. False 
systems of philosophy and false religions come not 
to fulfill, but to destroy. Cruel theologies, repre- 
senting God as arbitrary, merciless, and unjust, 
strike a deadly blow at what is generous and pure 
and noble in man. These moral absurdities are 
swept away by Jesus in the light of doctrines which 
touch the heart, enlighten the understanding, en- 
large our spiritual perceptions, and lead to a 
grander fulfillment of what a human being should 
be. 

" Here is the hold which Jesus has had on the 
world, and which he is to have more and more as 
the real character of his life and mission is under- 
stood, filling out what is wanting in us. His words 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 221 

have often been perverted. His doctrines have 
been mixed up with monstrous errors. But he 
came into the world to set us free from sin by fill- 
ing out before us the law of perfect holiness. He 
came to enlighten our minds by filling out our im- 
perfect ideas of God and man. He came to breathe 
into us his quickening spirit so as to fill out all 
our faculties by calling them all into healthful and 
harmonious activity. He came to our spiritual 
natures as the sun to the material world. He came 
not to destroy or suspend the laws of God, but to 
unfold them to us in their higher relations, and 
thus lead us upward into a freer and diviner life. 
He comes not as a power antagonistic to nature, 
but in harmony with all its workings, redeeming 
nature from the thraldom of ignorance and sin, 
that all its forces may act as beneficent agencies in 
the nurture and training of man as the child of 
God. 

" There are those who fear that the influence of 
Christ is passing away. I have no fear of that. 
False interpretations, which men have put upon 
the words of Jesus, are passing away, and, to those 
who believe in them as Christian truth, his reli- 
gion seems to be passing away with them. Clouds 
which obscure the heavens pass away. Doctrines 
which have wrongfully gained shelter and support 
under his great and holy name are passing away, 
and in the transition they may for a time take with 
them something: of the love and reverence which 
are due to him. But every superstition which sci- 
ence and the advancing intelligence of the world 



222 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

tear from the altar opens the way for us to behold 
in a clearer light the simplicity and majesty of the 
religion and the character of Jesus. Every un- 
natural form which has been cherished as a charm 
or device to save the soul from some evil being, as 
it melts away in the higher light that is dawning, 
will reveal to us in more harmonious and grander 
proportions the mind, the heart, and the life of 
Jesus. As the superstitious obstructions which 
have been placed in the way of our approach to 
him are one after another removed, and we are 
allowed to come to him and commune with him as 
he is, the fairest, the truest, the greatest among the 
sons of man, we shall find in him that which ful- 
fills all that we have sought after in our holiest 
moments, in our deepest longings, in our sense of 
weakness and of sin, in our passionate yearnings 
for deliverance, and in our loftiest visions of holi- 
ness and love and heaven. 

" Without his fullness, revealing us to ourselves, 
we are narrow, imperfect, feeble, sinful ; with it, 
we may have all our faculties quickened and press- 
ing on towards the fulfillment of our holiest wants. 
Towards this unfolding and filling out of our 
inward powers we are advancing as we live and 
believe in him. We go on through different stages 
of being ; our views are renewed and expanded as 
we advance. Those we now hold may at some time 
be wholly inadequate. New germs of life and 
better views are evolving through forms and expe- 
riences which pass away. Outward relations are 
dissolved that inward and purely spiritual relations 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 223 

may gain new vitality and power. The old home 
may pass away, but the heart which clung to it 
once lives more truly and joyfully now in the life 
which it first cherished there. Friends who no 
longer meet us in our daily walks live in our affec- 
tions, and draw us upward into a richer and holier 
fellowship. Frail forms which we once watched 
over with such tender, loving solicitude are resolved 
into dust ; but our dear ones who animated those 
forms are now each one as a loving presence with 
us, refining the atmosphere we breathe, and filling 
out our lives with sweeter and holier influences. 

" Every change is but a step in our advance 
heavenward. Death is but the act of evolving out 
of this into a higher form of life. And every- 
where, as we live and believe in Christ, that which 
destroys is only preparing the way for a further 
progress, that God's beneficent designs may be 
more entirely filled out and perfected in us." 

On the 14th of August, 1875, Dr. Morison sailed 
with his wife and daughter on the steamer Atlas 
from Boston for Liverpool. They were gone about 
a year, returning on the steamer China, which 
reached Boston on Saturday, September 2, 187G. 
About one half of the time was spent in Italy, prin- 
cipally in Rome. The journey was a quiet one, of 
which there is comparatively little to tell. At Ox- 
ford Dr. Morison attended a Gaudy dinner of the 
fellows and governing body of University College, 
which he enjoyed greatly. In December they 



224 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

reached Rome. The following extracts are from 
letters to his oldest son : — 

" December 19, 1875. 
" If we had been told thirty-three years ago that 
on December 19, 1875, we should be in Rome writ- 
ing to the child who was then just opening his eyes 
to the light of this world, we should have thought 
the prophecy a very improbable one. Yet here we 
are in this city, richer in art and more imposing in 
its historical associations than any other city in the 
world, and our thoughts have been more with you 
than with what lies around us. 

• •••••••• 

" Mary and I went this afternoon to St. Peter's 
Church, the greatest single work of man in matter 
— so great that, like Niagara, it cannot be taken 
in at once, but we must grow up to it by long- 
continued investigation. The worship that was 
going on in it while we were there seemed to me 
as much out of place as the worship of the old 
Roman priests and flamens would be in a Christian 
temple." 

" January 28. 

" The works of art here are very much as I ex- 
pected they would be. It is a great pleasure to 
see them, and I think I have learned a good deal 
from them. They show us what conceptions of 
Christianity were formed by men of the highest 
genius, and some of them men of the most devout 
lives, three or four centuries ago. They revolve 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 225 

round a narrower circle than I had supposed. Yet 
the two greatest of all, Michael Angelo and Ra- 
phael, like Dante three centuries before, seem to 
have recognized the relationship between all great 
prophetic souls, and between all genuine systems 
of culture and worship. The Sibyls and Venus 
and Psyche have their place with them, and are 
1 separated by no insuperable bounds from the Ile- 
• brew prophets and Christian apostles. Indeed, 
i the Roman Catholic Church has been too ready to 
> adopt, not the essential truths alone which should 
be everywhere, but the Pagan forms which limit 
and oppress the truth. Old Pagan Rome, as a 
ceremonial system, — flamens, vestal fires, Ponti- 
' fex Maximus, festal days, apotheoses of human 
1 beings, and the rest, — has been adopted by the 
| Church, and has subordinated to itself the sublime 
truths of our religion. It is a spectacular worship 
: that we find in the churches, while in the admin- 
' istration of the Church we see something of the 
marvelous power and skill with which the old 
; Roman government subdued and ruled the nations 
of the world." 

It was while in Rome that he prepared the auto- 
biography from which brief quotations have been 
made, the remainder of which is properly given 
here : — 

" In 1870 I asked for a colleague, that I might 

' be able to complete my work on the Gospels. But 

other duties providentially put upon me filled up 



226 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

my time. After nearly three years of faithful and 
intelligent labor in his profession, my dear friend 
and associate, Francis Tucker Washburn, whose 
short ministry had revealed to me rare qualities of 
mind and heart, was taken from us, and with a 
sense of bereavement and loss I again took up the 
work which had fallen from his hands. I never 
engaged in my profession with a deeper sense of 
personal responsibility, or entered with a more liv- 
ing interest or a keener sense of enjoyment into 
the great and solemn scenes which it presents. 
But I have reached an age when such a strain upon 
the faculties cannot long be continued with safety. 
I have therefore again asked to be relieved from 
my parish duties, and, as the only effectual way of 
accomplishing this, I am now spending a year in 
Europe. 

" My life has been marked by few events of any 
special interest. I have shrunk from prominent 
positions, and have been very happy in the secluded 
labors of my profession, in the means of usefulness 
which it has given, in the literary studies and pur- 
suits which are closely connected with it, and in 
the intimate and lasting friendships which it has 
helped me to form with some of the best people in 
the world. I hope to still live among the people 
Avith whom I have lived, giving and receiving such 
services as lie within our reach to smooth the path- 
way of life, and enable us to look forward with a 
stronger faith and a more fitting preparation for 
what lies beyond. With every new year I have 
had a richer experience of God's goodness and of 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 



227 



his universal care ; and it would indicate no small 
degree of intellectual and moral obtuseness, as well 
as ingratitude, if I had any fears of what is to 
come. I am not without hope that I may yet pre- 
>are a small work on the study of the Gospels 
better than any thiug I have yet done. Most of it is 
in my mind, the result of many years of thought 
and study. It is very pleasant to think of the oc- 
cupation which it may give, and thus to indulge 
the desire, perhaps more than the hope, to be still 
of some service to my fellow-men. All my studies 
and all my experience go to strengthen my faith in 
the substantial truthfulness of the Gospel narra- 
tive, and in the unspeakable value of the life and 
the truth which are revealed in them. 

" I have had many disappointments. But, as I 
look back, the predominant feeling in my mind is 
one of thankfulness. My life has been full of sat- 
isfactions and enjoyment. I have not attained to 
heights which I had once hoped to reach in intel- 
lectual or spiritual culture. But in many ways 
life has been a rich and beneficent gift, especially 
in my home, which has had its trials and shadows ; 
but no heart-rending grief has ever entered it. My 
children, two sons and a daughter, and my wife, 
have been spared thus far, so that I close this brief 
outline with devout gratitude and praise." J 

Of this autobiography he wrote from Munich on 
the 4th of June : — 

' I felt very much straitened in writing the auto- 

1 History of Peterborough, p. 1 92*. 



228 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

biography. But some time I hope to write for 
my children a minute account of my early life, the 
events which had the greatest influence on my mind 
and character, and the persons to whom I owe the 
greatest debt of gratitude. Almost all of these 
were omitted in my dry, statistical account, the only 
account which seemed to me proper for such a 
place. If I had had time, I should have been glad 
to contribute a few more pictorial sketches of some 
of the Peterborough people, — good men and wo- 
men, of whom no memorial will exist twenty years 
hence. But the old Peterborough race is scattered 
abroad. The descendants of those who made the 
place what it was when I first knew it are no longer 
there." 

Unfortunately, the more minute account was never 
written. 

Among his early Peterborough friends were two 
brothers, James and William H. Smith, the sons of 
John Smith, an older brother of the judge. In 
1833 they had moved to St. Louis and engaged in 
business there. A report of the failing health of 
the older brother brought the following suggestive 
words from Dr. Morison : — 

" Rimini, May 7, 1876. 

" I am sorry to hear from you so unfavorable an 
account of Mr. James Smith's health. I suppose 
that he has been, in his very modest way, one of 
the most useful men in St. Louis. We are having 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 229 

a poor type of rich men, who grow rich by sharp 
practices, with no intellectual or social culture, with 
vulgar tastes, purse-proud, with little sense of moral 
obligation or responsibility. James Smith had had 
small advantages of education, but a sublime sense 
of religious duty which gave dignity, refinement, 
and enlargement to his whole nature. The more 
such men we have the better. Vulgarity of mind and 
manners, for twenty years and more, seems to have 
been gaining the ascendency in business, in politics, 
and in the professions. A vulgar plutocracy is 
the highest power recognized in our large cities. 
A vulgar coarseness of manners and want of dig- 
nity in personal bearing have struck me painfully 
in Washington. Grantism is vulgarity. At our 
ministerial conferences I miss the high culture and 
modest refinement and elevation of mind that used 
to give such an air of respectability to our profes- 
sion. Our . . . have a sort of power not to be 
despised, but the high scholarship and breeding 
of men like Drs. Lunt, and Lamson, and Froth- 
inghara, and Walker were also a power in their 
way." 

The last place that he visited was Londonderry, 
from which his ancestors came. He made this 
visit alone, leaving his wife and daughter in Eng- 
land, and of it wrote as follows : — 

"Londonderry, August 11, 1876. 

• •••*•••• 

" This town rises pleasantly and rather steeply 
from the river, and on one side at least, within half 



230 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

a mile, there are hills which entirely overlook it. 
The old wall is standing. I walked round on the 
top of the wall this morning, a short walk of hardly 
moi*e than a mile. Within this narrow compass 
the neighboring people had been driven by a mer- 
ciless enemy, and for eight months they endured 
a siege from an army, at times, of not less than 
twenty thousand soldiers, bearing every kind of 
hardship and exposure — famine and danger — 
with a fortitude and courage such as has seldom 
been known. Macaulay's account of the siege is 
one of the finest things he ever wrote. From the 
wall I looked down the river two miles to the point 
where the boom was stretched across to prevent all 
access by water. 

" The town in its present state is rather disap- 
pointing. There are no relics of the siege, except 
guns and a cannon-ball, — no collections or descrip- 
tions that amount to anything, — no persons to 
whom I could go for information respecting the 
old inhabitants. Indeed, two hundred years sweep 
away every memorial of the existence of simple 
people such as we are descended from. If I should 
spend a month here, I do not think I could find 
any trace of any one of our ancestral families who 
left here less than one hundred and sixty years 
ago. So I shall leave the place for the Giant's 
Causeway this afternoon, and go on to Belfast to- 
morrow, probably going by boat to-morrow night 
so as to reach Glasgow on Sunday morning at 
eight o'clock. I really feel as if I were much more 
at home, and in the home of our ancestors, in Scot- 



LAST YEARS IN MILTON 231 

land than here. The outlines of the two countries 
are not unlike, and both remind me very much of 
New England. The visit which I made with you to 
my mother's birthplace in Windham — a part of the 
old New Hampshire Londonderry — was far more 
interesting and satisfactory to me than my visit 
here. But twenty years hence there will be nobody 
living who could tell you anything about the Hop- 
kinses and Reids who used to live there. Our 
record on earth lasts but a little while. It is well 
to have another and better record which cannot 
pass away." 

During Dr. Morison's absence in Europe, Rev. 
Frederick Frothingham had been settled as asso- 
ciate pastor of the church in Milton. On his arri- 
val in Boston, Dr. Morison went to Peterborough, 
where he spent a month, and then to Milton, where 
he lived through the winter. Mrs. Morison's lungs 
were delicate, and, it being important for her to 
escape the harsh New England climate, she spent 
the spring in the South. While in Rome Dr. Mori- 
son had written as follows : — 

" You speak of our selling our house and leav- 
ing Milton. I have not time to say much about it 
now. Milton has been for thirty years our home. 
The best part of my life has been spent there. 
Most of those who have been dearest to us in Mil- 
ton and elsewhere are dead. We have there a 
house endeared to us by many precious experiences. 



i 



232 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

We look out on fields and hills which welcome us f 
with grateful memories and associations. There -\ 
are many homes there which are glad to see us, J 
and which it is a great pleasure for us to visit. .1 
Our original friends will soon all be gone. And so >• 
shall we. We are too old to create a new home 
which will be to us what this has been and is now." 

During this winter, however, he decided that it 
was best to change his residence, and with the sum- 
mer of 1877 his life in Milton came to an end. 



IX 

OLD AGE 

In the summer of 1877 Dr. Morison sold his 
place in Milton and bought the house No. 26 
Marlborough Street, Boston, which was henceforth 
to be his winter home. 

Ten years before, his brother James, on return- 
ing from California, had bought a farm known as 
the " Uncle Sam Morison " place in Peterborough. 
On it was a good old house built by Samuel Mori- 
son, a younger brother of Dr. Morison's grand- 
father. 1 It was on this farm that Dr. Morison had 
performed his last day's work of farm labor; he 
did it during an Exeter vacation, and received half 
a dollar for the day's work. Soon after the pur- 
chase the brother decided not to occupy the place, 
and Dr. Morison and his oldest son united in buy- 
ing it from him, the title being taken in the name 
of the son. The son repaired and put in order the 

1 Samuel Morison married his double cousin Elizabeth Smith. 
They had six children, — one son, who died at the age of seven, 
and five daughters, three of whom lived to be old women ; one 
died in infancy and another at seventeen. Not one of the daugh- 
ters ever heard a sound. 



234 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

old house in 1876 and the following years, and by 
subsequent purchases very much increased the size* 
of the original farm. The first month after Dr.' 
Morison's return from Europe was spent in this; 
old house, and on his leaving Milton this old Pe- 
terborough farm became his residence for nearly J 
half the year. 

Three houses of the old New England farmhouse 
type, two stories high with the chimney in the 
middle, were built in Peterborough in three suc- 
cessive years, the oldest being Deacon Robert I 
Morison's house, built in 1791, in which Dr. Mori- 
son was born. These three houses now passed I 
into the same family. Dr. Morison's next oldest 
brother, Horace, had purchased his grandfather's 
house in 1852. Nathaniel Holmes Morison, the 
next brother, bought in 1857 the other house, built 
by John White in 1792. Horace Morison had 
died in 1870, but Nathaniel was in the habit of 
spending his summers regularly at Peterborough, 
and while he was there the two brothers met almost 
every day. 

On moving from Milton to Boston, Dr. Morison 
at first became a citizen of Boston, but he cared more 
for his native town than for the great city, and in 
1883 he transferred his citizenship to Peterborough. 
He was a citizen of Peterborough from his birth 
till his settlement in New Bedford in 1838, and 



OLD AGE 235 

from 1883 to his death, a little less than half his 
life. 

The anticipations which he had expressed in his 
letter from Rome, of being too old to create a new 
home, proved groundless. During the latter years 
of his life in Milton, a large number of his parish- 
ioners, including many of those whose friendship 
he valued most, were really residents of Boston who 
spent but a portion of the year in his town ; these 
people he found in Boston. There were many 
more of his old associates, both in his own profes- 
sion and out of it, in the city than in the smaller 

I town. From the day he moved to Boston he found 
himself in the midst of his best friends, and so it 
continued as long as he lived. 

In 1880 he was chosen a member of the Wednes- 

I day Evening Century Club, an organization more 
than one hundred years old, consisting of four min- 

i isters, four lawyers, four physicians, and a limited 
number of business men, who met weekly at the 

i houses of the members. He enjoyed these meet- 
ings exceedingly, and kept up his active attend- 
ance till 1891, when he resigned and was at once 
chosen an honorary member. He attended a 
meeting of this club as late as February, 1896. 

His household consisted of himself, his wife, and 
his daughter. His son Robert, his only married 
child, who had been settled in Meadville, Penn- 






236 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

sylvania, resigned his pastorate there in 1878, after 
which time he occupied a house in Peterborough, 
near his father, during the summer, and in 1885 
moved to Cambridge, where he was less than an i 
hour away from his father's house in Boston. 

In the spring of 1885, Dr. Morison delivered a 
course of lectures 1 at the Meadville Theological 
School. The following brief notice is taken from 
a Meadville newspaper : — 

" Dr. J. H. Morison closed his course of lectures 
yesterday afternoon with a very reverent and 
beautiful presentation of some of the ' Ideal Ele- 
ments in the Teachings of Jesus.' This series of 
discourses has been full of thought, deep religious 
insight, and sweet inspiration to a more living faith 
and a more extensive view of the ideal significance 
of life, using ' ideal ' now to mean the highest and 
truest conception of life : such an ideal life was 
the life of the man Jesus Christ, to whom we may 
all look for strength and inspiration. No one who 
has listened to these lectures can help having his 
horizon of life enlarged, and his vision of the life 
which now is, made more clear. 

" At the close of the lecture Dr. Morison made 
a few appropriate remarks of farewell and good- 
will, mingling in it some very sound advice out of 
his own rich experience." 

Dr. Morison always retained his interest in the 

1 These lectures formed the basis of a book which he pub- 
lished in 1885. 



OLD AGE 237 

Phillips Exeter Academy, and as long as he was 
able to do it he was in the habit of attending one 
or two of the terminal examinations every year. 

1 The venerable Dr. Soule died on the 28th of May, 
1879. Dr. Abbot and Dr. Soule together held the 
principalship of the Academy eighty-five years, each 
being there a full half century ; both were Dr. 
Morison's teachers ; Dr. Soule was the teacher of 
both his sons. Dr. Morison was invited to preach 

■ a commemorative sermon on the 8th of June in 
the Second Congregational Church (Orthodox) in 
Exeter, the church in the Academy yard. A few 
extracts are taken from this sermon : — 

" I think that our English ancestors, and their 
successors in this country also, were slow to recog- 
nize what ought to be the leading purpose of edu- 
cation. In the Gospels, the word StSao-KaAo? 
(teacher) occurs forty-eight times, and yet in our 
English version we find it rendered by the word 
teacher only twice, and by the word master forty- 
six times. 

" He was a very distinguished teacher. He 
. entered into what was already a great office, and 
left it greater than he found it. No mercenary 
motive was ever mixed up with its sacred duties, 
to degrade or vitiate his work. He loved it with 
his whole heart. He taught with singular precision 
and discrimination, and in such a way as to stimu- 



238 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

late the mind and call its faculties into play. He 
taught by his word and with his intellect, but, 
more effectively and to a higher purpose, by that 
pervasive, life-giving influence which, like the 
spirit of God, proceeds from a quickening, benefi- 
cent, commanding personality. In his access to 
the mind of God were the ' hidings ' of a power 
which made him what he was, and what no man 
can be of himself alone, — enabling him to train i 
his boys, not only for places of usefulness and trust 
and honor on earth, but that their names might be 
written in the book of life. Thus he became a co- 
worker with God, taught by Him as a lowly disciple 
of Jesus, and dispensing to others what he learned. 
" So do all our best instructors teach what they 
have learned from God. And so may we always 
be able to say to Him, ' All thy children shall be 
taught of the Lord ; and great shall be the peace 
of thy children.' " 

The Phillips Exeter Academy was incorporated 
in 1781, but the school was not opened till 1783. 
It celebrated its centennial in 1883, and Dr. Mori- 
son was the chaplain of the day. From this time 
on, whenever he attended an examination he acted 
as chaplain, until he came to be looked on as the 
venerable chaplain of the Academy. 

When he first moved to Boston, he was in the 
habit of going to Milton very often, as he said, "to 
see the people." These visits gradually became less 
frequent, but he always kept up his interest in the 



OLD AGE 239 

place. He remained senior pastor of the parish, 
Mr. Frothingham being the active minister, till the 
spring of 1885, when he formally resigned, so as to 
leave the parish free to call another active minister 
and allow Mr. Frothingham to remain as senior 
pastor. On the acceptance of his resignation the 
following engrossed document was sent to him by 
the Parish Committee : — 

" At a parish meeting held April 27, 1885, it 
was voted to accept your resignation as senior pas- 
tor of the First Congregational Parish, Milton. 

" The ' Parish Committee ' were instructed to 
convey to you an expression of the love and respect 
of the society toward you. 

" In attempting to obey the direction of the so- 
ciety, we are unable to find words or phrases ade- 
quate to fully express the sentiments of affection- 
ate regard which are the growth of your pastoral 
connection with this people for nearly forty years. 

" Of those who had reached middle life when you 
came to us, most have passed away. 

" Those who were then children have long since 
arrived at maturity and taken their places in the 
working forces of society, and through all these 
changes you have shared the joys and sorrows of 
your people ; and even in these later years, when so 
much of the ministerial work devolved upon your 
assistant, your appearance in the pulpit was an 
event hailed with the greatest pleasure by all. 

" The separation from this society, which is the 



240 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

consequence of your resignation, is but a form; 
there can be no real separation : the ties are deeper 
and stronger than any votes can affect, and so long 
as you live the hearts of this people will turn to 
you as their beloved pastor ; and in their behalf 
we express the earnest desire that in the remain- 
ing years of your life you may enjoy every blessing 
that can contribute to your happiness." 

On the 23d of June, Mr. Roderick Stebbins was 
ordained as pastor of the First Congregational 
Church in Milton. On the following Sunday Dr. 
Morison preached in the Milton church a sermon 
which is appropriately given here : — 

Finally, brethren, farewell. Be perfect, be of good comfort, 
be of one mind, live in peace ; and the God of love and peace 
shall be with you. — 2 Corinthians xiii. 11. 

" There are times when words of benediction and 
thanksgiving alone can satisfy us. Our sense of 
love and gratitude to those around us is meagre 
and insufficient till it allies itself with the love of 
God, and calls down his blessing on all who are 
dear to us, and on every human being. There are 
times when we seem to be standing on a higher 
plane of Christian experience, when our ordinary 
cares and solicitudes fall from us, and common in- 
cidents and events become instinct and alive with 
deeper meanings. At such times our minds and 
hearts are peculiarly open to all that is tender and 
uplifting in our relations with one another, and the 
light of God's love and truth, shining upon them 



OLD AGE 241 

with new effulgence, transfigures them before us, 
and endows them with a divine expression. 

"At such times we feel anew the prophetic char- 
acter of life, and of all that belongs to it. Our 
friendly greetings become benedictions, because of 
the love of God which is breathing itself through 
them. We talk on common topics. We express 
our kindly interest in one another. And all the 
while the light of higher worlds encompasses us. 
We feel that our love and kind wishes are enfolded 
in the love of God, and permeated by his quicken- 
ing spirit, under the impulse of these emotions. 
And, in the light of the higher science which is 
evolved from such experiences, everything becomes 
suggestive of something higher than itself. 

" Life, in all its departments, is to us, in our 
grandest moments, not a fulfillment, not a com- 
pleted fact, but an intimation, a germ, a prophecy, 
of something better. The intellect, conceiving so 
much and realizing so little, like the seashell with 
its low mysterious tones tells us of the boundless 
ocean of intelligence to which it belongs. Our 
affections, awakening to consciousness here in 
dreams of happiness which all the beauty and feli- 
city of this world cannot satisfy, make the dearest 
and happiest of our earthly relations not so much 
the fulfillment as the prophecy of a purer, sweeter, 
diviner union. Our moral natures, trained here to 
a sense of justice and to some imperfect compre- 
hension of the grander duties imposed upon us by 
our increasing love to God and man, unfold to us, 
as the necessary complement of our moral being, 



242 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

visions of a higher administration of justice tem- j'| 
pered with mercy, of a more perfectly ordered and 
more universally beneficent interchange of com- 
modities between man and man. The finer sense 
of justice cultivated by our Christian training, 
and nowhere more effectually than in the competi- 
tions and partnerships of business, not only prompts 
to a more scrupulous fidelity here, but points up- 
ward to a more perfect law and sphere. Our 
spiritual faculties, in their most intense moments, 
catching some flashings of light from holier worlds, 
bow themselves in adoration and humility before 
the infinite and eternal Presence. 

" Thus everything here, to our awakened minds, 
is suggestive of something higher than itself. This 
outward world, majestic and beautiful as it is, tells 
of a higher beauty. Our social relations, in our 
homes and neighborhoods and friendships, happy 
as they are, tell of a richer, deeper, holier joy. Our 
human life, the more richly endowed and the more 
faithful it is, turns all the more earnestly, ' in sure 
and certain hope,' towards a truer and better life. 
The religion of Jesus, strengthening this hope, 
purifying the affections, educating the conscience, 
quickening our religious consciousness, and holding 
up the promise of a world in which they may all 
have their fulfillment, would keep alive in us these 
prophetic instincts, and show us how they may be 
trained and cherished here and satisfied hereafter. 

" If we could only so live as to bring our daily 
thoughts and conduct into harmony with these 
loftier instincts and affections, every department of 



OLD AGE 243 

life would become a fore-court or preparatory school 
to the kingdom of heaven. But this lower world 
presses hard upon us. Our necessary cares and 
labors sometimes tyrannize over us. We are bowed 
down beneath our burdens, and find it hard to 
look up. The very training- which was intended to 
call out our better faculties sometimes benumbs or 
crushes them. We are content to live on a lower 
plane. And, while we are there, the higher expe- 
riences of which I have spoken are a mystery or a 
blank to us. We cannot quite believe in them. 
We do not know the wonderful reach of which our 
human faculties are capable, or the power that lies 
latent within us waiting to be born into a higher 
life. 

" It is to feed the grand, prophetic instincts of 
our nature, and to furnish the ideas and incentives 
which connect men with God, that Jesus came into 
the world, and established here his church. It is 
the office of that church to furnish ideas and 
motives which may help men upward in every stage 
of their being. Where there is nothing higher for 
the most advanced minds to look up to, no higher 
ideas of perfection to draw them upward, no new 
benedictions waiting to welcome them into a holier 
light or a profounder peace, there the church is 
wanting in its ministrations. It is more likely, 
however, that they who think themselves advanced 
beyond its teachings find them insufficient because 
they are themselves wanting in fidelity to its sim- 
plest and plainest precepts. The principal solici- 
tude and care of a church should be for the weak 



244 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

and the erring. The great law of life there as 
elsewhere must make itself felt in the services we 
render. A perfect Christian organization is one 
in which provision is made to meet the spiritual 
wants of all classes and conditions of men ; where 
higher truths and higher incentives to holiness are 
opening themselves to the highest minds ; where 
the more advanced, by word and example, and the 
subtle inspiration of a pure and earnest spirit, are 
helping on those who otherwise might lag behind. 
To the most advanced I would say, ' Be ye perfect, 
even as your Father in heaven is perfect,' and, as a 
means of attaining to this perfection, do what you 
can to help the weak. 

" In thinking of this church, my anxiety is not 
for the strong, except that they should labor more 
earnestly to awaken an interest for holy things in 
the hearts of those who are sluggish or indifferent. 
In leaving you, my anxiety has not been for the 
strong, or for those who are deeply interested in 
the best things, but for the weak, for those who 
are indifferent and careless, those who have never 
learned to feel the deep prophetic meaning that lies 
in everything around us, or to long for a holier 
benediction. We must seek to awaken loftier de- 
sires in them. We must strengthen them. We 
must help them forward. We must train and 
educate the young. We must encourage the de- 
sponding, and call back the erring. We must com- 
fort the afflicted by opening their hearts to the 
hopes and consolations of the Gospel of Christ. 
We must seek out the needy and the suffering, and 



OLD AGE 245 

help those who are in any way connected with or 
dependent upon us. A living church of Christ, 
endowed with his spirit, proclaiming by word and 
act the everlasting gospel to every creature within 
its reach, seeking to save the souls of men, and 
reveal to them the deeper prophetic meaning of 
this our human life and all its employments, — a 
living church of Christ, what a power for good 
ought it to be in a community ! If the churches 
intended for the people of this town, with differing 
creeds but in brotherly harmony and with a com- 
mon purpose, could only come up to the Christ-like 
idea of what they ought to be in all the offices of 
appeal, instruction, and moral and religious train- 
ing, endowed everywhere with the spirit of love 
and mercy, they would be filled to overflowing. 
Their beneficent, life-saving influence would be felt 
directly or indirectly in every home throughout the 
town. We should look on one another with differ- 
ent eyes. We should meet the terrible trials of 
life with different emotions. We should see in 
each child a possible angel. In every branch of 
industry we should behold, as in a school, the train- 
ing of immortal spirits. When, amid heavy trials 
and sorrows, neighbors and friends commune to- 
gether sadly of the events which have troubled 
them, we should see a diviner form, as of the Son 
of man, walking by them, infusing his spirit into 
them, causing their hearts to burn with higher 
thoughts and more uplifting emotions. The world 
around us would shine with a diviner light. Heart 
would answer to heart, as by the promptings of 



246 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

God's holy spirit. The grave would have no do- 
minion over us. We should greet our fellow-men, 
not as frail and dying creatures, but as born of 
God, and to an everlasting inheritance. 

" If only we could have some imperfect concep- 
tion of the possibilities of love and strength and joy 
which are included in a human life devoted to the 
purest ends ! Nearly sixteen years ago I had hoped 
that such a life, early consecrated to what is holiest 
and best, was to unfold its powers, and to extend its 
beneficent influences, in this place, through many 
happy years of usefulness and honor. I could not 
but rejoice to feel that the lessening rays, which 
had been seeking to enlighten you here for nearly 
a generation, would peacefully disappear in the 
fuller light that was growing upon you. But our 
fair morning star, while still a star of promise more 
than of fulfillment, was withdrawn from us, to dif- 
fuse its light in other worlds, or to fill its lamp 
from the eternal fountain. 

" Eulogy, it has been said, belongs not to the 
living, but to the dead. Yet to us the dead still 
live, and with them we exchange our solemn greet- 
ings, as we call to mind the pure and faithful ones 
who have had their earthly training here amid 
these beautiful works of God. Better men and 
women than I have known here, hearts and lives 
more richly endowed with all Christian virtues and 
affections, I cannot hope to find, unless it may be 
my privilege to meet them again in a more ad- 
vanced stage of being. Meanwhile it is a joy and 
comfort to think of them, here or elsewhere, as still 



OLD AGE 247 

alive, and still employed as God's messengers and 
ministers of love and mercy. 

" In the thought of them, we rise above the 
changes of time and death. We cannot think of 
them as dead. Our great household poet, who 
more than any other has sung for us the songs 
which have been cherished by our firesides, and 
given new sweetness to the domestic virtues and 
affections, a few years before his death read, in 
the college which he had left fifty years before, an 
exceedingly beautiful poem, of which the keynote 
is given in the words : — 

" ' We who are old, and are about to die, 

Salute you ; hail you ; take your hands in ours, 
And crown you with our welcome as with flowers.' 

There is a wonderful depth of pathos in the words, 
and a rich and tender interest in the lessons con- 
nected with them. But we may carry the thought 
still further upward. 

" ' We who are old, and are about to die,' 

— about to die that we may live forever, — salute 
you, our companions, on the same high plane of 
immortality. We who in our most favored mo- 
ments have been permitted to go up with our Mas- 
ter into the Mountain of Transfiguration, and, with 
our imperfect vision, to catch some glimpses of the 
great and saintly ones who, dying years or ages 
ago, are living still with him, would gladly salute 
you, and be welcomed with you into their com- 
panionship. 

" ' We who are old. and are about to die ' ! 



248 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

Rather let it be, ' We who are old,' and about to 
throw off these garments to which the odor of the 
grave is beginning to attach itself, and to put on 
the garments of immortality, we to whom the shin- 
ing portals of eternity are already opening, once 
more salute you, take your hands in ours, and ask 
that, in the diviner life into which the richest Chris- 
tian experiences are transmitting themselves, you 
may find, here and now, the tokens and assurances 
of a grander and more perfect life beyond. And 
as we earnestly desire to help you, so do we also 
desire you to help us. For, notwithstanding visions 
of transcendent joy and loveliness which sometimes 
flash upon us, we feel our weakness and insuffi- 
ciency. We need your sympathy, your prayers, 
your faithful and devoted lives, conjoined with ours, 
that we may advance more steadily towards what 
is holiest and best. 

" And now, my friends, with renewed thankful- 
ness and joy, I leave you with the pastor who has 
been laboring among you faithfully and unselfishly 
for the last ten years, and who is to be reinforced 
by the youthful zeal and hopefulness and strength 
of one who is to work with him as your minister. 
Only as you sympathize with them, and show that 
you take an interest in what most deeply interests 
them, can their labors in your behalf bear all the 
fruits which a Christian ministry should bear. It 
is no far-off prize which they are to gain for you. 
To make your daily lives here and now more beau- 
tiful, to gladden your homes with more disinter- 
ested and loving affections, to endow these young 



OLD AGE 249 

men and women with hopes and desires which shall 
make them a blessing to themselves and to all who 
are around them, to bring the infinite Love as a 
quickening power more effectually into every home 
and heart, — these are the purposes to which this 
church and its ministers are consecrated. The 
kingdom which they would establish is not of this 
world. But with its light and love from higher 
worlds it would fill, adorn, and enrich every inter- 
est in life. It comes with its gracious gifts and 
promises from above. It would enfold us round 
about with its eternal Presence. It would breathe 
into us a diviner peace, and be within us a blessed 
communion of the soul of man with the spirit 
of God, and with the spirits of just men made 
perfect. 

" With feelings sanctified by associations and 
friendships which can never die, I would now leave 
you and this house of prayer with words only of 
benediction and exhortation : — 

" ' The Lord bless thee and keep thee ; the Lord 
make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious 
unto thee ; the Lord lift up his countenance upon 
thee, and give thee peace.' 

" ' Finally, brethren, farewell. Be perfect, be of 
good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace ; and 
the God of love and peace shall be with you.' ' 

The words of the Parish Committee .had proved 
prophetic, and Dr. Morison's resignation from the 
Milton society had been but a form. Relations 
grew up between him and Mr. Stebbins somewhat 



250 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

like those which he had held with Mr. Washburn. 
Although in summer he attended the Peterborough 
church, from which he never transferred his mem- 
bership, and in winter attended the First Church 
in Boston, he also regarded Mr. Stebbins as his 
minister. Mr. Frothingham died in 1891. In 
February 1894, the nominal relationship with the 
parish was reestablished by a formal vote by which 
Dr. Morison was made Pastor Emeritus. 

Dr. Morison never prepared the small work on 
the study of the Gospels which he had hoped would 
be better than anything he had ever done. His 
study of the poets in connection with his strong 
religious feelings led to the preparation of a series 
of papers which he first spoke of as the Imagina- 
tion in Religion. Some of these papers were read 
in private houses, and he finally completed them 
in the form of a book which he entitled "The 
Great Poets as Religious Teachers." This little 
volume, published in the latter part of 1885, was 
his last book. 

Soon after moving to Milton Dr. Morison had 
become a member of the Boston Association of 
Ministers, an organization dating back to the sev- 
enteenth century. With his removal to Boston 
his interest in this organization increased, and he 
almost always attended its monthly meetings. 

In 1880 he became a member of the Ministers' 



OLD AGE 251 

Club, an organization comprising a number of lead- 
ing ministers from different denominations. This 
club met monthly at the houses of its members, 
and its meetings were among the occasions in 
which he took most satisfaction. The following; 
lines from a letter by an Episcopal member of the 
club shows how he was regarded there : — 

" His talk at the Ministers' Club was to me the 
very best that was offered, so that after hearing 
him I felt the inspiration long after. No one else 
gave just what he could give, or could occupy his 
high and spiritual point of vision. He impressed 
me with the force of those words, ' our conversa- 
tion is in heaven,' as if the veil might be lifted and 
reveal that we were grasping the eternal reality 
beneath all the imperfection of human language." 

While another member, a prominent Orthodox 
Congregational clergyman, wrote : — 

" Dr. Morison was honored and loved by every 
one who knew him, and he remains in my thought 
of him as one of the finest spirits whom I have 
ever known. 

" He had more of heaven about him, and less of 
earth, than almost any person I have known ; full 
of beautiful insight, beautiful feeling, high pur- 
pose, and loving and undisturbed trust in God." 

On the 5th of March, 1891, he read the follow- 
ing essay before this club : — 



252 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

ETERNAL LIFE. 

" I take it for granted that as Christian minis- 
ters we all believe in the life eternal. But, while 
we believe, we sometimes find it hard to realize the 
fact implied in that belief. What I propose in this 
paper is to suggest, within a narrow range, some 
incidental methods or processes by which a sense 
of personal immortality may enter into our daily 
consciousness so as to become a constant and vital 
factor in our lives. 

" The first great difficulty in this matter arises 
from the want of some distinct conception of life 
in its ongoings here and hereafter. My friend dies. 
I believe that he is still alive. But how does he 
live ? That is a question that is to be solved at 
first by our own personal experience. The eternal 
life lies at the centre of our spiritual being. When 
a man's spiritual nature is quickened he is born, 
of the spirit, into that higher life. With his pro- 
gressive advancement into what is spiritual or eter- 
nal, he has growing in himself the consciousness 
of a life quite apart from the vicissitudes of his 
mortal environment, and which • allies him more 
and more vitally with things unseen and eternal. 

" This is the great idea revealed to us by our 
Saviour, which runs as an electric thread through 
all his teachings, and which shows itself especially in 
the Fourth Gospel : ' I am come that they might have 
life, and that they might have it more abundantly.' 
(John x. 10.) Our inmost life has its source and 
its being in what is eternal. Time and change 



OLD AGE 253 

and death are hut ephemeral phenomena passing 
over the faithful soul, helping or hindering it in its 
further development, but having no power to de- 
stroy it, if it is but true to its deepest convictions. 
To be born into this life by the quickening of our 
inmost faculties, and to follow its deepest and holi- 
est intimations, — that is, to live and believe in him 
who is the resurrection and the life, — is the one 
essential condition for making our belief in immor- 
tality real and effective to us. In this way, and in 
this way only, our highest religious thought verifies 
itself to us, as in a scientific test, by an experi- 
mental process. To one who thus lives in obe- 
dience to its laws, the thought of the eternal life 
can never come as a strange thought. It enters 
into his daily consciousness. When our friend 
who has been living thus dies, if we have sympa- 
thized with him, we realize the significant fact that 
death dissolves the outside envelope only that in 
his inmost life he may be free to pass on. As in 
a seed, during his earthly existence the germ of a 
divine life has been fostering its secret energies, 
and developing within the material body an organi- 
zation adapted to a more advanced stage of exist- 
ence. And in this finer organization, this spiritual 
body, he passes on by an act of evolution through 
what is visible and mortal to what is unseen and 
eternal. 

" If we cannot tell precisely what this spiritual 
body with the life which animates it may be, no 
more can we tell precisely what this material body 
is and the life by which it is quickened. St. Paul, 



254 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

in his remarkable exposition of the subject, evolv- 
ing from the material body as from a seed the germ 
of a diviner organism, till it is transformed into a 
spiritual body, thus far follows what seems to be 
the order of nature. But when he adds, ' for this 
corruptible must put on incorruption,' etc., he de- 
parts from a strictly logical process of thought. 
The new organization is no longer reached, as in 
the quickening of a seed, by an evolution from 
within, but it is something put on from without, as 
a garment. Beautiful and impressive as this grand 
climax is, the unity of the thought is impaired by 
these two somewhat incongruous suppositions. If 
he had adhered to his first method, it would have 
been more in keeping with our Saviour's teaching : 
' Except a grain of wheat fall to the ground and 
die, it abideth alone, but if it die it bringeth forth 
much fruit.' It is through death, that is, through 
the dissolution of the physical body, that the soul 
in its spiritual body is evolved so as to attain to its 
higher condition of being. 

" I attach no great importance to any specific 
details that we may conceive in our speculations on 
this subject. Some sort of a body there must 
be. The soul of man as a spiritual entity, with 
no organic form, no organs by which to act or man- 
ifest itself, is to me inconceivable as representing 
a personal being. But a spiritual body, — what is 
that? Are not the terms spiritual and body in- 
congruous ? We hardly know enough of what is 
intrinsically involved in these terms to affirm that 
the}' may not belong to the same essence. Every 



OLD AGE 255 

year the most adventurous explorations of science 
are reaching farther into the realm of substances 
intangible and invisible, and are beginning more 
and more to imagine, or to recognize it as a fact, 
that in this realm probably are the ruling forces of 
the physical universe. Very unsubstantial to the 
finer perceptions of the foremost naturalists are 
the distinctions which separate science from philo- 
sophy, the laws and forces of the material world 
from the laws and forces of the intellectual and 
moral world. Matter and spirit, in their last ana- 
lysis, may be found to be the same substance or 
essence in its different stages of development. 

" In thinking, then, of our friends who have 
passed beyond the reach of our mortal vision, we 
may follow them on in the form that is most natu- 
ral to us, that is, usually a form not unlike that to 
which we have been accustomed. By thinking of 
them as still alive we acquire a habit of thought 
which recognizes death as only an incident in their 
progressive advancement. When they leave us, 
and our hearts are most deeply affected, and we 
long most intensely for their sympathy and fellow- 
ship, we may follow them till they have a perma- 
nent place in our minds. The habit of thus living 
with them will tend to strengthen our faith, to 
purify our hearts, and lift us up into a higher plane 
of thought and life. As the spiritual — that is, 
the eternal — life is unfolded, and becomes the life 
of our lives, the kingdom not of this world, in which 
Jesus lived, becomes more the home in which we 
live. In our most inspired moments, when we look 



256 JOHN HOPKINS M ORISON 

most clearly through the shadows of time and sense 
into what is heavenly and divine, we turn our 
thoughts in this direction, and abide there till the 
world which is of too fine a texture to affect our 
mortal senses becomes the one substantial reality 
which more than anything else draws our souls 
upward. For there is the one supreme object of 
adoration and worship. There is the one Mediator 
between God and men, in whom is revealed all of 
God that can be manifested to us through a human 
form and life. And there are not only the saintly 
ones of past ages ' in solemn troops and sweet 
societies,' but there, as we advance in years, are 
gathering most of those whom we have loved and 
honored while they were with us here, and who, 
transfigured by death, have helped to keep alive in 
us desires and affections which may bring down 
something of the sanctities of heaven to abide with 
us here in our hearts and homes. 

" The habit of following our friends in our 
thoughts reverently and lovingly, as they pass up- 
ward into this great fellowship of souls, may cer- 
tainly help to do away with, or at least to mitigate, 
the sense of loneliness and desolation which would 
otherwise be caused by their departure ; while it 
may do much to make the eternal life — the life of 
the soul, in which we seek to live — as real to our 
inmost consciousness as the other life that is going 
on within us and around us. And one of these 
lives will be no more mysterious and incomprehen- 
sible than the other. 

" As an illustration and confirmation of what I 



OLD AGE 257 

mean, I would mention an incident which I have 
treasured up among' the most sacred and beneficent 
experiences of life. When I was a schoolboy it 
was my great privilege to have my home in the 
family of a distant relative, an aged man of extraor- 
dinary gifts and attainments. Plis wife had re- 
cently died. His only son, a gifted and fascinating 
young man, was fatally ill. His only daughter — a 
lady of rare personal beauty, and as perfect a speci- 
men as I have ever known of what a richly endowed, 
unselfish, and thoughtful woman, in the full matu- 
rity of her womanhood, can be — was the presiding 
genius of the house, and an object of grateful and 
loving reverence to us all. But in the early sum- 
mer she died. It was my first bitter experience 
with death, and seemed to throw its deadly blight 
over everything around me. Nature, in all its June- 
tide affluence of life and beauty, only aggravated 
the sense of loss. I had no longer any heart for 
the studies in which I had been most deeply in- 
terested. The Bible was the only religious book 
that I had ever read with a vivid sense of its pro- 
found significance. Guided, so far as I can remem- 
ber, not so much by any distinct expressions as by 
the general tone of our Saviour's teachings which 
indicated the intimate relations between himself and 
the unseen world around him, I could not but think 
of my friend as already admitted to that goodly 
companionship. Gradually a great change came 
over me in my inmost thoughts. The kingdom of 
heaven was no longer afar off. Its softer light was 
all around me. It gave a new attractiveness to 



258 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

the woods and streams in my solitary walks. It, 
interfused something of its loving spirit into my 
secret thoughts and emotions, and gradually, I 
know not how, gave a richer coloring and a holier 
sense of reality to the highest conceptions I could 
form of the life beyond. From that time, death, 
which always before had haunted me with doubts 
or as a ghastly dream, has been robbed of its ter- 
rors and welcomed as a messenger of peace. 

" While I was questioning the propriety of bring- 
ing forward my own personal experiences in a paper 
of this kind, I happened, in opening a small vol- 
ume entitled ' Four Great Teachers,' to hit upon a 
letter of Robert Browning's. It was written to a 
lady who in a dying condition had applied to him 
for something that might be a help to her in her 
last hours. At the time of his wife's death he had 
recorded in her Testament what Dante had written 
after the death of his Beatrice, and now in his mes- 
sage to this dying friend he thus refers to it : ' As 
when Dante wrote what I will transcribe from my 
wife's Testament, wherein I recorded it fourteen 
years ago, " Thus I believe, thus I affirm, thus I 
am certain it is, that from this life I shall pass 
to another better, there, where that lady lives of 
whom my soul was enamored." ' 

" Here, and more powerfully indeed in the whole 
structure of his great work, — the greatest single 
poem that ever came from the mind of man, — we 
see how Dante was drawn upward by his loving rev- 
erence for the purest spirit that he had ever known. 
And, prepared by this discipline, as Mr. Lowell has 



OLD AGE 259 

said, he has shown us ' the way by which that coun- 
try far beyond the stars may be reached, — may 
become the habitual dwelling-place and fortress of 
our nature, instead of being the object of its vague 
aspiration in moments of indolence.' Sustained by 
such an authority, I could not regard the method 
which I have suggested as a childish fancy or de- 
vice. But, if Dante should be looked upon as led 
away by the dreams of a superstitious age, we have 
only to add the endorsement of his method by 
Robert Browning. If after nearly six centuries, 
in a different land, surrounded by different forms 
of worship, in the midst of a wholly different civi- 
lization, another great poet, of a wholly different 
temperament and different mental organization, as 
well as different habits of thought, a man of the 
largest and most masculine dimensions, could use 
his words as ministering to his own spiritual wants 
in his severest affliction, and fourteen years after- 
wards could think of no better message to send to 
a dying friend, it is not for us to think lightly of 
them or of the lesson they teach. We, too, in our 
deepest experiences of pain and grief, may find a 
world of comfort in following our dear and saintly 
ones with heartfelt prayers and benedictions, as 
they, ' from flesh to spirit changed,' rise from earth 
to heaven. We also may rise with them, obeying 
the inward promptings which bind us still to those 
whom we have loved and honored here, and who 
' are numbered now with the saints in glory ever- 
lasting.' 

" Heaven is thus brought nearer to us. I know 



2G0 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

that these conceptions of a higher life are at best 
poetic fancies, ideal pictures, but as such they asso- 
ciate themselves with spiritual truths so as to touch 
our hearts, awakening our deepest affections, and 
drawing us towards what is holy and divine. Still 
it is said they are unreal and imperfect symbols 
only. Yes, and what else but unreal and imperfect 
symbols are the truest conceptions which the great- 
est minds can form even of the boundless material 
universe in which we live ? The image of the sun, 
with its mysterious effluences of light and heat, in 
all its wonderful operations throughout the solar 
system as portrayed by the most far-seeing astrono- 
mer, is only an unreal and imperfect symbol of what 
the sun and its vital agencies really are in them- 
selves, and the forces with which they are endowed. 
And in the realm of spiritual agencies, what else 
but unreal and imperfect symbols are the highest 
conceptions that we, or the most gifted minds, can 
form of these things ? What else are the sublim- 
est visions of poets and prophets ? What else the 
divinest teachings even of him who spake as never 
man, before or since, has spoken ? What else are 
the most uplifting and inspiring passages we read 
in the Gospels, the Epistles, or the Apocalypse but 
symbols unreal and imperfect, as they must be 
from the limitations of our human language, but 
pointing upward, as do the sun, the stars, and the 
soul of man, towards the greatest, and to us the 
most vital and substantial, of all realities ? 

" But is not this whole matter of an intermedi- 
ate realm of spiritual agents between us and God 



OLD AGE 2G1 

merely a poetic fancy ? Have we any good reason 
for believing in it as an actual fact ? I cannot but 
think that science itself, in its most important ad- 
vances and disclosures, is pointing very decidedly in 
this direction. If, in its most significant discov- 
eries, science has established or divined any one 
universal fact, it is the bond of relationship which 
exists among all known substances on the earth or 
in the heavens. From Newton to Darwin, every 
great discovery has tended to show that all these 
substances belong to the same family, and are gov- 
erned by the same laws. And have we any reason 
to suppose that this unity of fellowship and design 
should be confined to material things ? Shall the 
spectroscope recognize the presence of kindred sub- 
stances in distant planets ? shall every particle of 
matter here respond to the attraction of kindred 
particles in the remotest heavens? shall the earth 
be bound by kindred laws to Venus and Saturn, 
and answer with ready sympathy to the sweet influ- 
ences of Pleiades, and man alone, the highest 
visible creation of God, have no relationship with 
kindred beings above himself ? While the heavens 
are everywhere filled with kindred bodies answer- 
ing to one another, is it reasonable to suppose that 
the vast interval that lies intellectually and spiritu- 
ally between man and God should be one bound- 
less realm of loneliness and desolation ? Shall ' the 
morning stars sing together ' and ' no sons of God ' 
be found, through all these infinite spaces, to an- 
swer back with their shout of joy ? Or shall we 
accept the teachings of Jesus as in accordance with 



262 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

the sublimest discoveries of science, and be glad- 
dened by the thought of spiritual relationships be- 
tween earth and heaven ; feeling, as we look into 
the face of 'one of his little ones' here, that in 
heaven their angels do always behold the face of 
his Father who is in heaven, and that ' there is joy 
in the presence of the angels of God over one sin- 
ner that repenteth ' ? Surely it is more reasonable 
for us to believe that when Jesus turned his eyes 
with open vision heavenward, he did not look up 
through dreary spaces, enlivened by no kindred 
spirits, but rather, as Mr. Emerson has said, ' be- 
held 

" ' Heaven's numerous hierarchy span 
The mystic gulf from God to man.' 

" The words of Jesus take us up into the purest 
ideal realm ever presented to the mind of man. But 
we do not feel those words as we ought till we wit- 
ness their perfect illustration and embodiment in 
himself. And even that sublime embodiment of 
truth and life would fail to have its full influence 
if its lessons were not brought home to us by the 
most saintly of his followers in past ages, and per- 
haps even more in our personal relations with those 
whom we love and reverence as most richly endowed 
with his spirit. The home, the church, the com- 
munity, which is blessed by such Christ-like exam- 
ples in the varied discipline and experiences of life, 
has advantages of Christian inspiration and instruc- 
tion which can hardly come through other and 
higher agencies. And when these friends, amid 
our prayers and tears, are taken up into the joys 



OLD AGE 263 

and sanctities of a higher realm, we need them still 

" ' As messengers of love [0 God] between 
Our human hearts and thee.' 

When they who once bore the image of the earthy 
shall bear the image of the heavenly, they may be 
clothed in bodies of too fine a texture to be seen 
by mortal eyes. They may be endowed with facili- 
ties of motion as swift as the sunbeams, and with 
organs of vision transcending our powers of con- 
ception. And, so equipped, they who once wound 
themselves into the very life of our lives, and 
brought so much of heaven with them into our 
homes, may still live on, angels themselves among 
the angels of God, and, like them, with a tender 
interest and guardian thoughtfulness for us. And 
is it not well for us on our side, in our secret 
thoughts, to keep alive some sense of our continu- 
ous relationship with them ? 

" I do not think of these relationships with the 
same assurance that I do of the immediate presence 
of God, or attach to them anything like tho same 
value. But I do feel that in the communion of 
saints — of our saintly ones — there is laid open to 
us, through the imagination at least, a world which 
is in harmony with our Saviour's teachings, and 
which appeals very tenderly to our better sym- 
pathies and affections. As we accustom ourselves 
to dwell in that world with those who have entered 
there, we may be cherishing ideas and associations 
which cannot but purify our hearts, enlarge our 
spiritual conceptions, and so help to draw us into 



264 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

more vital relations with Christ and with Him who 
is his Father and our Father, and his God and our 
God. 

" But in speculations like these we must be upon 
our guard. Different minds act by different meth- 
ods, and are acted upon by different incentives. 
That which is a help to one may be a hindrance to 
another. The views which I have suggested, pos- 
sibly with undue emphasis, even if true, are only 
subordinate truths, and, if allowed to take the fore- 
most place in our minds, they are no longer true. 
A longing for immediate intercourse with those 
we have loved may be so excessive as to make us 
impatient of the only legitimate way by which to 
approach them, and then it can end only in disap- 
pointment or illusion. The communion of saints 
may be a salutary truth, but the worship of saints 
or of angels is idolatry. Subsidiary views, as such, 
may be helpful, but they must never be allowed to 
supplant the great central truths and influences by 
which alone the souls of men are to be saved, and 
the woriH adeemed and sanctified." 

On March 28, 1891, Dr. Morison preached in 
King's Chapel in Boston a sermon from the text, 
" But we trusted that it had been he which should 
have redeemed Israel " (Luke xxiv. 21), which he 
had written specially for this occasion. 

On the 21st of October, 1891, Dr. and Mrs. 
Morison celebrated in a simple way their golden 
wedding. Among the interesting features of the 



OLD AGE 265 

clay was a box of gold sent by the members of his 
two parishes, with an engrossed list representing 
fifty people from New Bedford, where his active 
ministry had terminated forty-eight years before, 
and more than a hundred from Milton. 

The last time that Dr. Morison ever spoke in 
public was at the dedication of the Peterborough 
Town Library. He always took a great interest 
in this library. In his centennial address in 1839 
he said : — 

" Our libraries demand a moment's attention. 
There had been previously a library of a similar 
character ; but as early as 1811 the Peterborough 
Social Library was got up, containing not far from 
one hundred volumes. So judicious a selection I 
have never seen. There was hardly a book which 
did not deserve its place. I well remember the 
astonishment with which, at the age of eleven, I 
first looked on what seemed to me such an immense 
collection of books ; nor can I soon forget the uni- 
form kindness with which my early reading was 
encouraged, and in some measure directed, by the 
librarian, Daniel Abbot. In an intellectual point 
of view, I look back on no period of my life with 
so much satisfaction as on the two years when, at 
the age of fourteen and fifteen, I lived with Sam- 
uel Templeton, as honest a man as this or any 
town has ever produced. During the hour which 
he always gave me at noon, and in the evening 
by firelight, I read the standard histories in our 



266 JOHN HOPKINS MORIS ON 

language, and made myself acquainted with the 
important events of the ancient world. When a 
volume was finished, I would set out at dark after 
a hard day's work, walk three miles to the village, 
and, enriched with a new treasure, would return, 
almost unmindful of the woods and their near vicin- 
ity to the graveyard and old meeting-house, which, 
especially on a wintry autumnal night, standing 
there naked, black, and lonely, was, as I know full 
well, a fearful object to a child. The Peterborough 
Social Library became gradually neglected, and 
was sold about 1830, when a new library on the 
same plan was got up, and contains now about 
three hundred volumes." 

The Peterborough Town Library rightly claims 
to be the oldest library of its class in the country 
or in the world. The library had been housed in 
various places until in 1891 Mrs. Nancy S. Poster, 
of Chicago, and Mr. William H. Smith, of Alton, 
111., natives of Peterborough, and grandchildren of 
William Smith and Elizabeth Morison, made gener- 
ous gifts to erect a permanent structure for this 
library. Both Mrs. Foster and Mr. Smith were 
born in the same year as Dr. Morison ; although 
he did not contribute to its cost, the gift of the 
library building was really due to him. The mat- 
ter was placed by them in the hands of Dr. Mori- 
son's oldest son, who directed the construction of 
a building, and provided a part of its cost. The 



OLD AGE 267 

building was erected in 1892, and the library was 
moved into it eai'ly in the following year. The 
formal dedication exercises took place in the Peter- 
borough Town Hall on the 5th of October, 1893. 
After the more formal exercises, the closing re- 
marks were made by Dr. Morison, who spoke par- 
ticularly of the Smith family as he remembered 
them as a boy and as a man. His thoughts seemed 
to carry him away ; he had expected to speak less 
than ten minutes, but he continued for half an 
hour. At times those who sat near him felt afraid 
that he coidd not get through ; his reminiscences 
had awakened the tenderest emotions in his own 
mind, and he transferred these to his hearers. No 
record was kept of his words, but those who heard 
him then will never forget the earnestness of his 
last public uttei-ance. 



X 

THE END 

Of Dr. Morison's two sisters, the younger, Car- 
oline, had died in Michigan in 1849, and the older, 
Eliza, in Peterborough in 1867. Of his four bro- 
thers, Horace, the oldest, died in Peterborough in 
1870 ; James, the youngest, in Quincy in 1882 ; 
and Nathaniel in Baltimore in 1890. The other 
brother, Samuel, the twin of James, whose home 
had been in California for more than forty years, 
died there in 1893. Dr. Morison, the oldest of 
the five brothers, was left the only survivor of his 
generation. His health had never been better ; he 
was a vigorous old man. In the summers he was 
in the habit of driving about Peterborough, and in 
the winters he took long walks in Boston. 

On the 22d of January, 1894, while returning 
from a visit at dusk, he was knocked down by an 
express wagon on Boylston Street, the end of the 
shaft striking him immediately over the eye. He 
walked home, and the injuries were apparently 
not very serious, though it took him some time to 
recover. He apparently got well, but the shock 



THE END 269 

had affected his heart iu a way which he never 
understood. 

Early in the morning of Saturday, March 7, 
1896, Dr. Morison had a stroke of apoplexy ; it 
occurred soon after midnight, when he was found 
unconscious on the floor of his chamber in Boston. 
He rallied from the attack, recovered conscious- 
ness during- the day, and improved slowly. His 
two sons and his daughter-in-law were in the city 
of Mexico, but they started for Boston on the next 
day, and arrived on the Saturday following the 
stroke. He continued to improve, with some slight 
setbacks, for several weeks. Though much of the 
time he spoke rationally, his mind was not entirely 
clear, and it was apparent that, however much he 
might regain his physical strength, it was not prob- 
able that he would ever recover his full mental 
faculties. He could not fully realize where he 
was, but generally seemed to think he was in Peter- 
borough. On the 20th of April there occurred 
a decided change, and from this time he failed 
steadily. On Friday the 24th he ceased to take 
nourishment, and from this time onward he was 
entirely unconscious. On Sunday morning, April 
26, at 10.25 o'clock, he ceased to breathe. The 
windows were opeu, and the sound of the morning 
church-bells came in ; the sound came from the 
chimes of the Arlington Street Church, the church 



270 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

of Dr. Channing, who had such an influence on 
Dr. Morison's early life ; it seemed specially fitting 
that the bells of this church should be so asso- 
ciated with his last moments on earth. 

On Tuesday, April 28, after a brief service at 
the house in Marlborough Street, the body was 
taken to the Milton church, which was filled with 
his old parishioners and many other friends. Five 
clergymen, among them the minister of his New 
Bedford church, and one of his nephews, bore the 
casket to its place in front of the pulpit where he 
had preached for so many years. It was in front 
of this pulpit that his face was seen for the last 
time. The services were conducted by Rev. Rod- 
erick Stebbins, who also made the following ad- 
dress : — 

" If it be true that the most sacred spot on earth 
to civilized man is his home, then to a minister 
there is a second like unto it, namely, his church ; 
for the faithful minister ever carries his church 
near his heart, thinking day and night what he can 
do to make it more serviceable to mankind. A 
man who held this place very dear, a minister who 
worshiped, taught, and prayed here many years, has 
gone from among us. When the bells he was ac- 
customed to hear were ringing the call to service, 
his spirit answered a heavenly summons. 

" It is fitting that hither we come, where the 



THE END 271 

associations and memories of the past, the hopes 
of the fixture, the spirit of love and faith dear to 
him, may hush our disturbing thoughts, and temper 
our private griefs to finer issues. 

" To many of you, his name and form have been 
familiar for a long period of years. To many he 
has been the type of all good ministers, from 
whose holiness benedictions have rested in abun- 
dant measure upon your sorrows and your joys. 
To me, whom he welcomed to this church nearly 
ten years ago, he has been a constant and sympa- 
thetic friend. Your knowledge of him, better than 
mine, makes it unnecessary for me to refresh your 
minds in regard to the facts of the life that is ended 
for us here. There are, however, some things so 
characteristic of him, and that belonged to his rare 
nature, that we may well recall them at this time. 

" The first of these was his affection and devo- 
tion to this church. He regarded it with a love 
that came from his years of faithful service and 
from the close and tender relations he bore to the 
families worshiping here. The expressions of your 
affection for him were a source of great happiness 
in these later years, when his period of active ser- 
vice was over. The anniversaries that you remem- 
bered, the flowers you sent, and, in his own words, 
' the thought and affection, sweeter than the flow- 
ers,' helped to round out the completed happiness 
of his days. 

" It is fifty years since he first stood in this place 
as your minister ; and during all that time, while 
nearly two generations have come and gone, this 



272 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

church has been the one above all others to which 
his thoughts most affectionately turned. In these 
days, when the relations between minister and peo- 
ple are more easily broken than they used to be, it 
is good to think of this man, for half a century the 
minister of this church. It is good to think of 
this church, for half a century loyal to this man. 
My knowledge of him was in his home, where he 
was the simple, sincere, and gracious friend. His 
mind — alert, active, interested in scholarly pur- 
suits and in the questions of the day — made him 
an instructive and valued companion. His spirit 
gave the atmosphere to the home, and set the key of 
reverence and of love to which the life of the house- 
hold was attuned. He was the most guileless and 
ingenuous of men. He looked upon the world as 
his friend. He expected good from it, and good 
only did he receive ; for, if by chance a rudeness 
or a slight came his way, he did not perceive it, but 
went on, unconscious of a breath of criticism or 
dispraise. Therefore his life was happy from the 
inherent simplicity and purity of his own heart. 

" And in outward circumstances, in the love and 
devotion of those near him, in the vicissitudes of 
human fortune, he was happy beyond the common 
lot of man. Once, as we walked together over 
Milton Hill, and looked across the valley to the 
sea beyond, he repeated the lines of Addison's 
hymn, — 

" ' Where peaceful rivers soft and slow 
Amid the verdant landscape flow.' 

No better could the tranquillity of his own life be 



THE END 273 

described, so many years of which were passed 
near that favored spot. 

" Many of ns need the chastening experience of 
great ills to quicken our spirit and manly quali- 
ties ; but here was a man whose grateful heart was 
conscious of his blessings before they were with- 
drawn, and who in prosperity and in peace thanked 
God for his abundant mercies. 

" Though sheltered thus from many of the mis- 
fortunes of life, and by his own nature gentle and 
single-minded, there was no weakness in him. He 
had the manliness of a strong nature, of a mind 
dwelling in the heights of moral being, of a heart 
resting on a supreme faith in God. He was im- 
bued with a deep religious spirit, that seemed to 
make his life and thought a kind of offshoot from 
the providence of God. 

" And so, when I think of him, it is with affec- 
tion, with gratitude, and with praise. I am at 
peace. All is well, and he who was so strong in 
faith shall reassure my weaker trust, until like him 
I shall look upon death as God's way to light and 
life." 

The body was then taken to the Milton grave- 
yard. Forty years before, his children had been 
fond of playing under a big pine-tree in a pasture. 
This pasture had been added to the graveyard, 
and when this was done Dr. Morison had selected 
the lot on which this tree grew. The body of his 
beloved colleague, Mr. Washburn, had been buried 



274 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

in this lot, and here what remained of the senior 
pastor was laid away, " in the sure and certain 
hope of the resurrection to eternal life through our 
Lord Jesus Christ." 

After preaching his last sermon, Dr. Morison 
expressed a wish to preach a sermon on the Joy of 
Life. He wrote this sermon in Peterborough in 
1893, expecting to preach it in Milton in October, 
but he was not able to do so. He took great satis- 
faction in writing this sermon, and he worked over 
it from time to time, hoping to preach it ; it was 
left in this way when he died. 

On the Sunday after the funeral Mr. Stebbins 
read this sermon at the morning services in the 
Milton church. On the following Sunday, May 
10, 1896, Kev. A. W. Jackson delivered the same 
sermon in the church at Peterborough, preceding 
it with some remarks of his own. The sermon, 
with Mr. Jackson's remarks, forms a fitting close 
to this volume : — 

" It seems most fitting that the services of to-day 
should be a memorial of Dr. Morison. For not 
only was he a man widely known, and honored and 
revered and loved wherever known, but in a spe- 
cial sense he belonged to you. Very early in my 
ministry here, I discovered in him a peculiar inter- 
est in this church, — an interest that deepened as 



THE END 275 

years went on. His presence here, too, whether in 
pew or in pulpit, was a grace of which you were 
deeply sensible. And I am not surprised to see 
the proportions of this audience considerably in- 
creased by members of other churches who have 
come in ; for Dr. Morison belonged not merely to 
this church, but to this town. Peterborough has 
sterile acres ; her corn and wheat she cannot boast ; 
but she has been singularly productive of strong 
and useful men. Yet of all the noble array, as I 
judge men, no one has more honored the town than 
he. By instinct a scholar, in mental outlook large, 
of practical wisdom and broad and affluent sympa- 
thy, of unbending rectitude, and with soul reaching 
upward and ever upward, if, as you make up your 
jewels, you feel that he was of them all the fair- 
est, I can only agree with you. 

" It is hard to have opportunity to speak of such 
a character and not bear testimony. But it is hard 
also to select the terms in which testimony shall 
be borne, especially when so many graces meet 
and are so harmoniously blended, and emphasiz- 
ing anything seems so like slighting other things 
as deserving to be emphasized. Most men, whom 
we honor, in some respects disappoint us, and we 
apologize while we praise. Our heroes are apt to 
be rude and our saints to be sickly. Here, how- 
ever, was a hero who was a gentleman, and a saint 
who was well. The saint you readily admit ; all 
the atmosphere of the man was suggestive of the 
type of character you know as the saintly. And 
as his atmosphere, so his life and work. When 



276 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

Father Hyacinthe was in this country, a clergyman 
said to him : ' Well, after all, it is the simple duty 
of the minister to point men to Christ.' ' No,' said 
Father Hyacinthe, ' it is to be Christ to them.' 
That such was Dr. Morison, you know ; with him 
you felt the presence of the Master whom he loved 
and served. But the hero, — how of that ? He 
was a man of peace ; his ministry, which was his 
life, was a ministry of reconciliation. But do you 
suppose he was never sensible of a whisper in his 
ear, ' All these things will I give unto thee if thou 
wilt fall down and worship me ' ? The moral poise 
and dignity you marked in him were the result of 
moral victories won, it may well have been, where 
the fight was hard. 

" We often celebrate unity of character as some- 
thing exceptional and unique. Strictly speaking, 
I do not suppose it so ; most men, if we only knew 
them, should be found, even when their actions are 
inconsistent with one another, yet consistent with 
themselves. It is the unifying principle, not the 
unity, by which men are most distinguished ; and 
what that was in this dear friend it is not possible 
that you do not know. Up in Dublin they tell a 
pleasant story of Dr. Bartol, who preached there 
one summer Sunday morning. He announced his 
text : ' A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump ; ' 
and then, looking over the congregation, he quaintly 
remarked, ' We don't want much religion.' Paus- 
ing for this unusual proposition to carry its full 
effect, he went on : ' We only want a little, but we 
want that little all through.' Dr. Morison's religion, 



THE END 277 

call it little or call it much, was all through. This 
was his unifying principle ; in this his heroism and 
his saintliness are alike explained. In his daily 
conduct, in his benevolences, in his courtesies, in 
his ' little, nameless, unremembered acts of kind- 
ness and of love,' it was manifest. 

" But it is not to me, but to him, that you have 
come to listen. Though through my lips, he will 
again speak to you. The sermon I bring you is 
the last he ever wrote. It was written about two 
years ago, with intent that it should be his last, for 
his Milton congregation. Strength failed, and he 
was never able to preach it. It was therefore read 
to the Milton congregation last Sunday morning, 
and it seems eminently appropriate that I should 
bring it here to-day. It is an old man's account 
of the joy of life. Many even in more vigorous 
years gloomily question whether life is worth liv- 
ing. To such it must be especially well, and to 
all surely profitable, to hear what this octogenarian 
could say. 

These things have I spoken unto yon, that my joy might re- 
main in you, and that your joy might he full. —John xv. 11. 

" ' The distinguished scholar and writer, Ernest 
Kenan, once stated as a remarkable fact, that no 
literature in the world has ever made such frequent 
use of the word "joy " as the New Testament. He 
might also have added that no literature in the world 
had ever given such depth and fullness of meaning to 
the word as the New Testament. However encom- 
passed the religion of Jesus may have been by men 
professing to be his disciples, that religion, in its 



278 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

very nature, as it was lived and taught by him and 
his immediate followers, was preeminently a joyful 
religion. It was originally announced as tidings 
of great joy. And whenever it takes possession of 
the whole man, awakening all his powers of mind 
and heart, it more than anything else opens within 
him the sources of a higher life and a more stead- 
fast joy. 

" ' We are born here into a material environment. 
Our lower faculties are first awakened. There is 
a joy in this awakening of the senses, and a still 
higher joy in the awakening and exercise of the 
intellect and the affections. In a healthy nature 
there is a glow of happiness in every experiment of 
living, and the consequent further development of 
thought and feeling. But with the development 
of our higher faculties, we feel straitened and 
cramped by the limitations of the world around 
us. Science, in its wonderful progress, advancing 
through gross material agencies to those which are 
more refined, slowly learns that the mightiest pro- 
cesses in nature, the motions of planets and stars, 
the growth of plants, the physical life of animals 
and men, and above all the unfolding faculties 
of the human soul, are moved and governed by 
agencies and laws which no eye hath seen and no 
one of our senses can divine. Here are intima- 
tions or outshadowings of a presence, an agency, 
embracing the material universe, interfusing itself 
everywhere as the latent central force, or quicken- 
ing life, of all that we can see or know. Here are 
intimations of a power without which no other can 



THE END 279 

exist. Here are intimations, and some day through 
the keener insight of science in its further advances 
there may be demonstrations, of a life without 
which no plant can grow, no human soul can awake 
to a consciousness of the deeper significance of all 
this world in which we live, or catch more than un- 
certain glimmerings of the divine light in which 
the beauty of the rose, the stars, and " the human 
face divine," may be seen when transfigured to us 
as they really are in the higher developments of 
our faculties. 

" k Now here to us, because of the incompleteness 
of knowledge in which we are left amid these yet 
unfinished explorations of science, is where our reli- 
gion comes in with its higher and more beneficent 
ministrations. It takes a child by the hand, and 
shows him the lilies of the field how they gi'ow, and 
this leads him to a recognition of One who, himself 
unseen, clothes them with a beauty beyond the 
reach of our human art. We are thus placed in 
an ideal realm, and yet a realm filled out and quick- 
ened by the most substantial and life-giving of all 
realities. Thus it is that Jesus, by his life and 
teachings, would prepare us to recognize and wor- 
ship Him in whom we live and move and have our 
being. By methods in harmony with the laws of 
our being, he would bring us more and more into 
vital relations with them. Thus we are made to 
feel more and more that we are compassed about 
by the laws and agencies of a spiritual kingdom. 
As we, in our higher natures, are born into this 
higher realm, conceptions of a joy unknown to us 



280 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

in our lower experiences arise before us, and, in the 
light which they throw around us, this material 
world assumes a new significance. To our awak- 
ened sensibilities and larger conceptions, the visible 
universe moves on with a diviner harmony, and we 
are prepared to respond with a deeper joy. Now, 
visionary as these views may appear to those who 
see them only from afar, and unreal as they may 
be in their literal interpretation, in their essence, 
in their legitimate influence on the souls of men, 
and in our highest experiences, they are the most 
substantial and the most vital of all realities. 
Here, in the presence of things " eternal, immortal, 
and invisible," we have some foretaste of what is 
meant by the words of our Saviour, " These things 
have I spoken unto you, that my joy may remain 
in you, and that your joy may be full." 

" ' But I wish here and to-day to treat my sub- 
ject in the most simple and practical manner, and 
to show, though in a superficial way, how these 
words, which in their fullness go down into the 
deepest, holiest experiences possible to men, may 
also connect themselves with our common, every- 
day pursuits. We all desire to be happy. But 
the most sensible and practical of men often engage 
with all their hearts, and spend the better part of 
their lives, in enterprises which can end only in 
disappointment. When the transient excitements 
of success have subsided, their occupation is gone, 
and nothing satisfactory remains. I have some- 
times thought that the greatest disappointments 
in life come to those who are thought to be most 



THE END 281 

successful. That to which they have been looking 
forward with intense desire, and for which they 
have been striving long and earnestly, loses its 
charm when it is gained. The bird which was so 
attractive when on the wing is secured, and as we 
hold it in our hands the poor, lifeless thing awak- 
ens in us only a feeling of sadness or self-reproach. 

" ' We would be happy. We are endowed with 
faculties which, rightly exercised, cannot fail to 
make us so. They point to other exercises which 
excite within us pleasurable sensations, and which 
would lead us on from day to day to something 
better still. Enterprises which awaken thoughts, 
emotions, affections, such as purify the atmosphere 
in which we live, while increasing the opportunities 
within our reach, increase also our powers of using 
and of enjoying them. If we thus live wisely and 
not selfishly, seeking whatsoever things are honest, 
true, and lovely, we shall, with constantly growing 
sense of enjoyment, work our way upward. New 
resources of interest and pleasure will be opening 
before us, and offering themselves to us to be used 
as new means of usefulness to others and of happi- 
ness to ourselves. 

" ' This life, which I have endeavored to suggest 
by broken intimations rather than by any direct 
description, is a life which in its fullness is not un- 
like that which is pervaded, inspired, and animated 
by the thoughts and the life of Jesus. It is a life 
of progress, both in itself and in its satisfactions 
and enjoyments. We are imperfect, but working 
our way upward. We have the faults of our qual- 



282 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

ity, and suffer the consequences till we subdue them. 
But even here we are not forsaken. We sometimes 
take the wrong path, and with painful and uncer- 
tain steps, as one who has lost his way in a wilder- 
ness. But we try to find it again. And if there 
is grief in losing, there is joy in regaining it. 

" ' Sometimes we make willful mistakes. But 
even then, in the bitterness of self-reproach, in the 
agony of our repentance because of the wrong that 
we have done to a friend or neighbor, and most of 
all to our own better nature, in the very pang of 
grief which causes us to change our course, and 
turn our face homewards towards our Father's 
house, in the very humiliation with which we pros- 
trate ourselves before Him, there is a sense of 
relief. And at length, in - our perfect reconciliation 
with God and man, and most of all with our own 
souls, there is a satisfaction, an intensity of joy, 
such as we sometimes see in a little child that 
throws itself all penitence and tears into its mo- 
ther's arms, and the two have never before loved 
each other so dearly, or trusted each other so en- 
tirely. And so it may happen that our very fail- 
ings, and the sufferings consequent upon them, may 
furnish the occasions on which our tenderest sensi- 
bilities may be quickened, and our deepest joys 
intensified. 

" ' A life of cloudless sunshine with no dark or 
stormy passages, a life of continuous prosperity 
interrupted by no misdeeds or misgivings, no sharp 
reproaches of conscience, no torturing pains of 
body or mind, may seem to be the ideal of what a 



THE END 283 

Christian life should be. And very lovely in many 
instances have been the lives which have been 
formed under such influences. Their ways are 
ways of pleasantness, and all their paths are peace. 
But we are not all so constituted. There are capa- 
bilities in the soul of man which cannot always be 
called out, or find their fitting exercise, with such an 
experience. What would have become of the great 
qualities of Abraham Lincoln, which place him 
among the greatest men of all ages, if he had not 
been made to bear as no other man did in his own 
heart the sorrows of a whole people in the mighty 
throes and agitations and slaughter through which 
they had to pass as the retribution, and as the only 
means of deliverance from a grievous national sin ? 
There are hopes reaching upward to the very throne 
of God which could never have attained to such 
heights of joyous fulfillment were it not for the 
deep and fearful experiences through which they 
have passed. In the noblest specimens of human- 
ity there are refinements of nature which never 
could have been quite so secure in their attachment 
to what is holiest and best, there are sympathies 
with the sufferings of others which never could 
have been quite so tender and so forgetful of self, 
had it not been for the bodily pains and infirmities 
in which they have had their birth and training. 
We are indeed fearfully and wonderfully made. 
And, sometimes by processes even more fearfully 
and wonderfully ordained, our noblest faculties are 
trained to the finest issues, and endowed with capa- 
bilities for entering into the deepest, holiest, and 



284 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

happiest of our Christian experiences. Nor alone 
in the grander fulfillment of man's immortal des- 
tiny in a world yet to come, which is better fitted 
than this for the advanced training of human beings, 
shall the song of the redeemed be sung by those 
who have come out of great tribulation. But even 
here in their richest and holiest experiences that 
song has been sung, — nay, it is being sung to-day, 
by men and women who have done, or who are now 
doing, what they can to redeem and bless the world. 
Nor is this confined to the few conspicuous exam- 
ples. In the common walks of life, among the 
plain people who claim no peculiar distinction for 
themselves, these great processes of moral and spir- 
itual refinement are going on. Not silver and gold 
alone are passing through the fiery furnace, but 
iron, the most common and useful of all metals, in 
being subjected to flames even more fierce and 
searching, is thus endowed with a more delicate 
fibre, and wrought into a stronger texture. 

" ' But, after all, it is in our common duties and 
relations, and most of all in our homes, that we are 
to look for the fulfillment of the promise, " that my 
joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be 
full." In our homes more than anywhere else the 
great and solemn issues of life, the great and solemn 
mysteries of life, are working themselves out for 
weal or woe to us, according to the temper and dis- 
position with which we enter into and fulfill our 
duties. All other interests are of small account, 
all other social distinctions and advantages are of 
small account, compared with the habits and feel- 



THE END 285 

ings which show themselves in the little, and for 
the most part unconscious, acts and expressions of 
kindly interest, and which go so far towards mak- 
ing up the fullness of joy and comfort in a happy 
Christian home. 

" ' Next to the home are the hardly more conspi- 
cuous and hardly less beneficent influences which 
come from the thoughtful and kindly offices of good 
neighborhood. In the country especially, we have 
found it a matter of very considerable interest to 
know who are for the season to occupy the two or 
three vacant houses which are within a mile or two 
of our home. People who, in their conversation 
and their lives, know how to answer most effect- 
ively the question, " Who is my neighbor ? " may 
in a single season give a new beauty to the land- 
scape, and create a new relationship of thought and 
kindly affection in those whom they meet. So 
friendships are sometimes formed which may add 
no one can tell how much to the joy of living. 

" ' This thought of neighborly relations admits 
of a wider application than I have suggested. The 
question, "Who is my neighbor?" was put evi- 
dently by an amiable young man and a man of good 
intentions. But the answer was more than he was 
ready to accept. " He was very sorrowful," we are 
told, " for he was very rich." We all of us would 
like to be rich. With few exceptions among men, 
the principal business of life lies in this direction. 
Practically speaking, we are all intent on gaining 
money. But there are two things to be considered 
here, or this money-making becomes a perilous busi- 



286 JOHN HOPKINS MORI SON 

ness. How to make it, is morally as well as finan- 
cially a momentous question, and it is carefully and 
generally considered by good men. But how to 
use it is too often pushed aside. And because men 
do not meet this question fairly and squarely on 
generous and Christian grounds, " they empty 
themselves by their accumulations." While they 
grow rich outwardly, they become impoverished in 
the higher qualities and attainments which alone 
can enrich and satisfy a human soul. Few things 
reveal to me so painfully the poverty of soul as the 
purposes for which money is lavishly expended. 
Whether the amount be great or small, whether 
the man be poor or rich, the result is the same, — a 
growing insensibility to the wants of others, and to 
the higher claims of their own natures ; an increas- 
ing hardness of heart ; a drying up of the generous 
instincts and affections which should reach out 
according to their means in narrower or broader 
offices of brotherly kindness, through mediums not 
only of private charity or public beneficence, but 
in enterprises by which a man of large and liberal 
nature can benefit the community while he is also 
securing his own interests. 

" ' When I was at Rimini, a half -deserted city in 
Italy, I saw there a fine triumphal arch erected to the 
Emperor Augustus as a token of thankfulness from 
the people because of what he had done to repair 
their roads. And a little way out from the city 
there still remains in good condition a bridge which 
he had caused to be built nearly two thousand years 
ago. These were to me the most impressive memo- 



THE END 287 

rials that I saw of what that great man had been, 
and what he had done for the Roman people. A 
hundred years ago and more, there lived in Boston 
and in this town a member of the Federal Street 
Church there and of this our church. There is pos- 
sibly no one living here now, since the death of 
Mr. Charles Breck, the patriarch of the town, who 
remembers him. The only visible memorial of 
him that I remember seeing here was the name of 
John McLean, which a friend had caused to be cut 
in the milestones of the Brushhill Turnpike to ex- 
press the gratitude of the people for the improve- 
ment which he made in the roads. We know very 
little of the life he led, except that he was a hard- 
working, upright, prosperous merchant. In this 
church, as well as in the Boston church to which he 
belonged, there is a fund bearing his name for the 
benefit of needy persons not paupers belonging to 
the parish. Doubtless, in thinking over the pro- 
vision which he was thus making to add a little 
something to the comfort of these people, as the 
winter of the year and the winter of life was com- 
ing on, and this through future generations, his 
kindly nature was touched, and a glow of satisfac- 
tion passed through him. But by the large bene- 
factions which he made in his lifetime, or to take 
effect after his death, his name and memory be- 
came associated almost as their founder with two 
institutions which have done more perhaps than 
any other institutions in the land for the relief of 
human suffering. This certainly may be said of 
the Massachusetts General Hospital, where ether 



288 JOHN HOPKINS MORISON 

was first employed in its beneficent ministry, 
taking away, as it did, the terror and the pang 
connected with the most painful of surgical opera- 
tions. 

" ' But, not to dwell on this single and rather 
remarkable case as an illustration of my subject, 
while standing here I need to speak only of those 
whom I have known, and whose lives have done so 
much to purify, enlarge, and intensify my concep- 
tions of the joy that is spoken of in my text. 
There is a book entitled " The Lives of Twelve 
Good Men," which I have read with much satis- 
faction. But in this small parish, within my per- 
sonal acquaintance and among those who have been 
very dear to me, I could name more than twelve 
good men and women who to my mind stand out 
as living in harmony with the spirit and the teach- 
ings of Jesus, and furnishing, in its essential fea- 
tures and elements, examples of Christian living as 
true and as inspiring as these which I find among 
the distinguished divines, — " the twelve good men " 
of the book I have mentioned. They are all now, 
I trust, numbered with the saints in glory everlast- 
ing. But they also live on here in the hearts and 
lives of those who knew and loved them. They 
speak to us of a joy which may touch our deepest 
emotions, and quicken within us sensibilities to 
what is holiest and best. 

" ' But, with all its joys, — and they may be very 
great, attending us from youth to age, as angels of 
love and mercy, — this human life of ours has its 
features of sadness. While it may grow richer in 



THE END 289 

its satisfactions and enjoyments, it is also attended 
by incidents, experiences, and memories which 
touch us with a pathos more tender and affecting 
as we advance in years. Our companions leave us 
by the way. But it is not all bereavement. The 
flowers which filled our spring-time with gladsome 
expectations faded long ago. But the fruits which 
were growing out of them when kindly thoughts, 
unselfish desh*es, and devout affections transform 
themselves into deed, have been going on mellow- 
ing and ripening through the autumnal days, and 
greet us with a fullness and maturity of joy, a 
serenity and peace, hardly known to us in our 
busier season. We have our tears to shed. But 
there are tears of joy as well as of grief. And 
they come from a deeper source, and lift us up into 
an atmosphere more heavenly and divine. On a 
beautiful autumnal day, in a public garden, I met 
a dear friend, whose life — one of the happiest that 
I have known — had been spent in doing good. 
He had completed his eightieth year. Not age 
alone, but a fitful and violent disease, had been 
breaking in upon his strength of mind and body. 
He spoke calmly of these increasing infirmities, 
and of failing powers. Then, in a glow of almost 
triumph, he added : " For one thing I am most 
thankful, and that is, that, whatever may fail, my 
faith in the perfect love and goodness of God never 
fails." ' " 



LIST OF PUBLISHED WRITINGS OF JOHN H. 

MORISON. 

An Address, delivered before the Golden Branch Society 
of Phillips Exeter Academy, August 22, 1839. Pp. 23. 
Boston, 1839. 

An Address delivered at the Centennial Celebration in 
Peterborough, N. H., October 24, 1839. Pp. 99. Boston, 
1839. 

On Prayer. Printed for the American Unitarian Associa- 
tion. Pp. 20. Boston, 1841. 

A Sermon on Spiritual Existences. Pp. 11. Boston, 1841. 

A Sermon [on the Death of Children], preached before 
the First Congregational Society, in New Bedford, Sunday 
Morning, November 27, 1842. Pp. 16. New Bedford, 1842. 

Life of the Hon. Jeremiah Smith, LL. D. Member of 
Congress during Washington's Administration, Judge of the 
United States Circuit Court, Chief Justice of New Hampshire, 
etc. Pp. viii, 516. Boston, 1845. 

Memoir of Robert Swain. Pp. 259. Boston, 1847. 
(Privately printed, 1846.) 

On Vicarious Atonement. Printed for the American Uni- 
tarian Association. Pp. 22. Boston [1850 ?]. 

Danger of Believing Too Much. Printed for the Ameri- 
can Unitarian Association. Pp. 11. Boston [1851 ?]. 

Scenes from the Life of Jesus. Pp. x, 137. Boston, 1852. 

A Sermon, preached at the Installation of Rev. George W. 
Briggs, as Pastor of the First Church in Salem, January 6, 
1853. Pp. 63. Salem, 1853. 

Our Common Schools. A Discourse preached at Milton, 
January 30, 1853. Pp. 24. Dedham, 1853. 



292 WRITINGS OF JOHN H. MORISON 

A Sermon preached ill the First Congregational Church, 
Milton, June 4, 1854. Pp. 18. Boston, 1854. 

A Memorial of Rev. Ephraim Peabody, D. D. Pp. 42. 
Boston, 1857. (Repriuted from The Christian Examiner 
and Religious Miscellany, March, 1857.) 

Amusements. Pp. 15. Boston, 1859. (Reprinted from 
The Monthly Religious Magazine and Independent Journal, 
January, 1859.) 

Disquisitions and Notes on the Gospels. Matthew. Pp. 538. 
Boston, 1860. 

Two Sermons preached in the First Congregational Church 
in Milton, on the 15th and 22d of June, 1862, and suggested 
by the Centennial Celebration on the 11th of June, 1862. 
Pp. 55. Boston, 1862. , 

Dying for our Country : a Sermon on the Death of Capt. 
J. Sewall Reed and Rev. Thomas Starr Kiug; preached in 
the First Congregational Church in Milton, March 13, 1864. 
Pp. 28. Boston, 1864. 

Sermon preached in the Second Church, Boston, on the 
Death of Mary E. Robbins (wife of Rev. Chandler Robbins, 
Minister of that Church), June 26, 1870. Pp. 20. Boston, 
1870. 

The Beauty of Change. A Sermon, preached in Milton 
the Sunday before the Ordination of an Associate Minister. 
Pp. 14. Boston, 1871. (Reprinted from The Religious Maga- 
zine and Monthly Review, April, 1871.) 

Discourse at the Funeral of the Rev. Francis T. Washburn, 
Junior Pastor of the First Congregational Parish in Milton, 
January 2, 1874 ; with remarks prefatory thereto, as printed 
in The Monthly Religious Magazine for February, 1874. 
Pp. 22. Boston, 1874. 

Charles Sumner. A Sermon, preached in Milton, March, 
15, 1874. Pp. 9. [Boston, 1874.] (Reprinted from The 
Unitarian Review and Religious Magazine, April, 1874.) 

Personal Influence. Pp. 12. [Boston, 1879.] (Reprinted 
from The Unitarian Review and Religious Magazine, Feb- 
ruary, 1879.) 



WRITINGS OF JOHN H. MORI SON 293 

The Teacher [Gideon Lane Soule]. A Commemorative 
Sermon preached in the Second Congregational Church of 
Exeter, N. II. Pp. 20. Boston, 1879. 

Angelina Grimke Weld. Pp. 10. [Boston, 1879.] (Re- 
printed from The Unitarian Review and Religious Magazine, 
December, 1S79.) 

Genuineness of the Fourth Gospel. Internal Evidences. 
Pp. 34. Boston, 1882. (Reprinted from The Unitarian Re- 
view and Religious Magazine, May, 1882.) 

The Great Poets as Religious Teachers. Pp. 200. New 
York, 1886. 

He was also editor of the following works : — 
Christian Days and Thoughts. By Rev. Ephraim Pea- 
body, D. D. Pp. 13, 304. Boston, 1858. 

Hymns Supplementary to the late Dr. Greenwood's Collec- 
tion of Psalms and Hymns for Christian Worship. Added 
A. D. 1860. Pp. viii, 132. Boston, 1860. 



INDEX 



Abbot, Abiel, 43, 80. 

Abbot, Benjamin, 32, 33, 41, 46, 82, 
237. 

Abbot, Daniel, 29, 265. 

Alumni Association of Harvard Di- 
vinity School, 107. 

American Unitarian Association and 
Slavery, 149-155. 

Amherst College, 53, 54. 

Antrim, N. H., 13, 14, 21. 

Augustine, Saint, 125. 

Austin, William, 43. 

Autobiography in Class Book, 47-49. 

Autobiography in History of Peter- 
borough, 29, 31, 32, 33, 45, 52, 53, 
CO, 61, 64, 65, 88, 145, 146, 225-228. 

Baltimore, 85. 

Bartol, Cyrus A., 276. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 125. 

Beecher, Lyman, 125. 

Belfast, Maine, 54. 

Bell-ringing at Exeter Academy, 41. 

Boston Association, 250. 

Boston Latin School, 57. 

Boston School for the Ministry, 113. 

Bowdoin College, 55. 

Bowdoin, Gov., 74. 

Breck, Charles, 101, 287. 

Brown, Addison, 31. 

Browning, Robert, 258, 259. 

Buckingham, Edgar, 51. 

Buffalo, N. Y., 86. 

Bunyan, John, 125. 

Burns, Anthony, 161, 169. 

Calhoun, John C, 159, 178. 
California and the Union, 199, 202. 
California Vigilance Committee, 198. 
Cambridge, 43, 44, 45, 92. 
Change, beauty of, 130-145. 
Channing, William Ellery, 70, 76-79, 

81, 94, 125, 270. 
Chicago, S6, 87. 
Christian Liberty, 113-127. 
" Christian Register," 105, 146, 156, 

211. 
" Christian World," 148. 
Class Book, 47. 



Cleveland, Rev. Mr., 42. 

Coleridge, S. T., 93. 

Colorado, 87. 

Commentary on the Gospel of Mat- 
thew, 106. 

Communion service, 60. 

Congdon, Charles T., 90, 91. 

Congregational Church, division of, 
80. 

Convention of Congregational Minis- 
ters, 107. 

Dante, 258, 259. 

Dartmouth College, 53, 54. 

Death, 98, 144, 223, 257. 

Dewey, OrviUe, 58, 59, 61-63, 81, 91, 

93, 94. 
Discouragements, 34, 38, 39. 
Divinity, study of, 56, 57, 59, 64. 
Dover, N. H., 70. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 111, 262. 

Emery, Samuel M., 40. 

Endicott, Samuel, 36. 

English Unitarians and Slavery, 148. 

Eternal Life, 252-264. 

Euclid, 32. 

Exeter, N. H., 30, 31, 69, 92. 

Exhibition at Exeter, 39, 40, 44, 45. 

Fast Day sermon, 176-187. 

Fayetteville, N. C, 6, 19. 

Forbes, John M., 73, 101. 

Foster, Nancy S., 266. 

Frederick, Md., 85. 

Frothingham, Frederick, 231, 239, 

250. 
Frothingham, Nathaniel L., 229. 
Fugitive Slave Law, 156. 

Gannett, Ezra Stiles, 101. 

Gilman, Joseph Smith, 30,31, 32, 36, 

42. 
Golden Branch Society, 39, 45, 291 . 
" Great Poets as Religious Teachers," 

236, 250. 
Gregg, James, 18. 

Hampton, N. H., 40. 



296 



INDEX 



Hanover, N. H., 53, 54. 

Harvard College, 22, 43, 46, 51, 52, 

54, 107. 
Harvard College, Morisons graduated 

from, 50. 
Harvard Divinity School, 64, 82, 107, 

211, 212. 
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 133. 
Hepworth, George H., 113. 
Hildreth, Richard, 31. 
Holmes, Elizabeth, 4. 
Holt, Rev. Mr., 34. 
Holt, Sarah F., 36. 
Homes, early New England, 109-112. 
Hopkins, Betsey Ann, 18. 
Hopkins, James, 13, 21. 
Hopkins, John, 17. 
Hopkins, John, Jr., 13, 15, 17, 18. 
Hopkins, Mary Ann, 6, 17. 
Hurd, Joseph, 87. 
Hurd, Ruth, 87. 
Hyacinthe, Father, 276. 

Immortality, 252-264. 
Indians in Peterborough, 3. 
Installation at Milton, 101. 
Intemperance, 12. 

Jackson, Abraham W., 274. 
Joy, sermon on, 277-289. 

Keene, N. H., 70. 

King, Thomas Starr, 201-205. 



Labor question, 64. 
Ladd, William, 38. 
La Fayette, 78. 
Lamson, Alvan, 229. 
Law, study of, 53, 57. 
Lexington, Mass., 51. 
"Liberator," 148. 
Liberty, Christian, 113-127. 
Lincoln, Abraham, 283. 
Londonderry, Ireland, 1, 2, 229-231. 
Londonderry, N. H., 1, 6, 17, 24, 80. 
Longfellow, Henry W. , 247. 
Lowell, James Russell, 258. 
Lunenburg, Mass., 4. 
Lunt, William P., 229. 

Macaulay, Thonias Babbington, 123, 

230. 
McLean, John, 287. 
Marsh, Ezekiel, 34, 35. 
Meadville Theological School, 236. 
Medicine, study of, 56. 
Medina, Mich., 23, 86. 
Memphis, Teim., 16. 
Milton, 101-103. 
Milton Academy, 104. 
Milton, Bicentennial Celebration, 107. 
Milton home, 101. 
Milton, John, 118. 



Milton Meeting-hovise, 102, 103. 

Milton Public Library, 128. 

Ministers' Club, 250, 251. 

Monadnoc, 26. 

Moore, James, 30. 

Morison, Caroline, 22, 50, 86, 268. 

Morison, Eliza, 11, 19, 60, 268. 

Morison, Elizabeth, 3, 4, 14, 16, 2C6. 

Morison, Emily Rogers, 84, 104, 264. 

Morison, Ezekiel, 6, 8. 

Morison, George Shattuck, 2, 16, 74, 
87, 104, 224, 233, 266. 

Morison, Horace, 25, 50, 234, 268. 

Morison, James, 50, 128, 268. 

Morison, Jerusha F., 54. 

Morison, John, 1. 

Morison, John, Jr., 1, 4, 23. 

Morison, John Hopkins : birth, 25 ; at 
school in Peterborough, 25, 31 ; farm 
work, 10, 21, 29, 48, 233 ; in a store, 
30, 31, 49 ; at Exeter Academy, 
32-45, 49; fighting in boyhood, 
50 ; debts, 34, 36, 40 ; difficulties in 
obtaining education, 36, 38 ; teacher 
in Exeter Academy, 33, 44 ; teach- 
ing school in Peterborough, 43 ; in 
college, 43, 45, 46, 52 ; teaching 
school while in college, 51, 52 ; 
plans to study law, 53 ; teaching 
school in Cambridge, 55, 58 ; choice 
of profession, 53, 56, 57, 59 ; teach- 
ing school in New Bedford, 58, 59, 
60, 63 ; joins the church, CO ; lec- 
turing, 61, 64 ; illness, 63, 65-67, 
94 ; in Divinity school, 59, 64 ; in- 
structor in college, 64 ; first sermon, 
67 ; ordination, 79, 94 ; ministry at 
New Bedford, 79-100, 145; mar- 
riage, 84, 87 ; at Salem, 89 ; instal- 
lation at Milton, 101 ; ministry at 
Milton, 100, 129, 145, 239, 249 ; on 
Milton school committee, 104 ; as 
editor, 105, 146 ; degree of D. D. , 
107 ; professor in Boston School for 
the Ministry, 113 ; as parish min- 
ister, 127 ; class in literature, 128 ; 
lecturer in Harvard Divinity School, 
211 ; as preacher, 212 ; visit to 
Europe, 223-231 ; removal to Bos- 
ton, 233, 235 ; resignation of Milton 
pastorate, 239 ; pastor emeritus at 
Milton, 250 ; golden wedding, 264 ; 
last sermon, 274, 277 ; death, 269 ; 
funeral service, 270. 

Morison, Mary, 104, 224. 

Morison, Mary Ann, 6, 10, 13, 17-23. 

Morison, Nathaniel, 4-12, 16, 17, 19, 
20, 23. 

Morison, Nathaniel Holmes, 18, 50, 
234, 268. 

Morison, Polly, 5, 15. 

Morison, Robert, 4, 5, 9, 23, 37. 

Morison, Robert Swain, 74, 104, 235. 

Morison, Sally, 5, 15. 



IXDICX 



297 



Morison, Samuel, 14, 233. 
Bforiaon, Samuel Adams, 268. 
Morison, spelling of the name, "23. 
Morison, Thomas, 2, 3, 5, 14, 23. 
Morison, Thomas, Jr., 54. 
Morison, William, 80. 
Morrison, Leonard A., 23. 
Motley, John Lothrop, 51. 
Mumford, Thomas J., 213. 

Natchez, Miss., 8, 12, 17, 20. 
National Conference of Unitarian and 

other Christian Churches, 113, 121- 

127. 
Naushon, 70, 72-76, 79. 
New Bedford, 72, 73, 79, 90. 
New Bedford, school at, 58, 59, GO, G3. 
New England, influence of, 87. 
Newport, R. I., 76. 
Newton, John, 125. 
Niagara, 86. 

Nichols, Ichabod, 35, 54. 
Northampton, Mass., 53. 
Northborough, Mass., 51. 

Ordination at New Bedford, 79, 94. 
Oxford, 223. 

Palfrey, John G., 64. 
Parkman, Francis, 80. 
Patriotism, 182, 183, 194. 
Peabody, Andrew P., 106, 148. 
Peabody, Emily Morison, 95. 
Peabody, Ephraim, 80, 82-85, 88, 89, 

90, 95, 96, 100, 293. 
Peabody, Rhoda, 84. 
Peterborough, N. H., 1, 2, 3, 4, 25, 26, 

27, 34, 43, 47, 57, 66, 92, 233, 234, 

275. 
Peterborough, N. H., Centennial Cele- 
bration, 85. 
Peterborough, N. H., Congregational 

Church, 60. 
Peterborough, N. H., first settlement 

of Morisons in, 1, 2, 3. 
Peterborough, N. H., Meeting-house, 

26. 
Peterborough, N. H., Presbyterian 

church, 4, 80. 
Peterborough, N. H., Social Library, 

29, 265, 266. 
Peterborough, N. H., South Factory, 

7, 10, 20. 
Peterborough, N. H., Town Library, 

265-267. 
Petty Monadnocs, 26. 
Philadelphia, 85. 
Phillips Exeter Academy, 32, 44, 82, 

104, 105, 237, 238. 
Pittsburgh, Pa., 85. 

Quincy, Josiah, 52, 58. 
Quincy, Mass., 128. 



Reed, James Sewall, 189, 19G-201, 

203-205. 
Reed, John, 189. 
Reid, Isabella, 13, 14, 17, 18. 
Religion, importance of, 81. 
" Religious Magazine," 105, 113, 146. 
Renan, Ernest, 277. 
Ripley, Ezra, 197. 
Rogers, Abner, 87. 
Rogers, Emily Hurd, 87. 
Roman Catholic Church, 224, 225. 
Rome, 223-226. 

St. Louis, Mo., 85. 

Savannah, Ga., 147. 

" Scenes from the Life of Jesus," 

105. 
School Committee of Milton, 104. 
Scotch Irish in New Hampshire, 1, 

17, 80. 
Scott, John, 8. 
Secession, 177, 178. 
Shattuck, George Cheyne, 73, 74. 
Shattuck, George Cheyne, Jr., 51, 73. 
Slavery, 86, 147-175. 
Smith, Ariana, 44, 45, 257. 
Smith, Elizabeth, 3, 4, 14, 16, 233. 
Smith, Fanny, 27, 28. 
Smith, James, 228. 
Smith, Jeremiah, 2, 5, 11, 15, 16, 37, 

38, 40, 44, 50, 52, 55, 69, 70, 72, 73, 

85, 129, 147. 
Smith, Jeremiah, Life of, 90, 147. 
Smith, Jeremiah, Jr., 69. 
Smith, John, 4, 11, 228. 
Smith, Jonathan, 43. 
Smith, Mary, 3, 14. 
Smith, Samuel, 4. 
Smith, William, of Exeter, 43, 44. 
Smith, William, of Peterborough, 3, 

4, 14, 28, 266. 
Smith, William H., 228, 266. 
Smithsonian Institution, 62, 63. 
Social questions, 64. 
Soule, Gideon L., 33, 46, 47, 237, 238. 
Spiritual body, 253-255. 
Stebbins, Roderick, 240, 249, 270, 

274. 
Steele, John H., 6. 
Stetson, Caleb, 80. 
Sullivan, George, 40. 
Sullivan, James, 39. 
Sumner, Mrs., 101. 
Sunday School in Peterborough, 27. 
Superstitions, 102. 
Swain, Robert, 73, 74, 79, 147. 
Swain, William W., 70, 72, 73, 74, 79. 

Tcmpleton, Samuel, 265. 
Thirty feet of Morison, 50. 
Tobacco, use of, 12, 22. 
Town government, 108. 
Townseud, Mass., 3. 






298 



INDEX 



Trenton Falls, 86. 
Twitchell, Amos, 67. 

" Unitarian Review," 105, 146. 

Walker, James, D. D., 229. 

Walker, James, Esq., 43. 

Walks, 34, 53. 

Wallace, Margaret, Miss, 5, 13, 15. 

Wallace, Margaret, Mrs., 5, 15. 

Wallace, Matthew, 15. 

War, 171, 179-181, 188. 

War of the Rebellion, 176-205. 

Ware, Henry, 55, 64. 

Ware, Henry, Jr., 55, 58, 64, 101, 

212. 
Ware, Mary L., 101. 



Warren, Me., 54. 

Washburn, Francis Tucker, 206-211, 

212-214, 226, 246, 273. 
Washington, George, 78, 173. 
Weaving, hand, 21. 
Webster, Daniel, 155-157. 
Webster, Josiah, 40. 
W. lnesday Evening Century Club, 

235. 
White, Daniel Appleton, 87, 89. 
White, John, 234. 
White, Ruth Hurd, 104. 
Wilmington, N. C, 6. 
Wilson, James, 27. 
Wilton, N. H., 84. 
Windham, N. H., 6, 231. 
Wordsworth, William, 93. 



J 






